


vincula occultum (hidden bonds)

by dwyndling



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Dream Eater Riku (Kingdom Hearts), F/M, Gen, M/M, Multi, Mutual Pining, Polyamory, Post-Kingdom Hearts III, addendum it's more body horror than i anticipated, damn where's maleficent when you need her, destiny trio centric, heterosexuals don't exist in kingdom hearts, kairi is somewhat feral don't @ me, not long enough to be a true slow burn but slow burn vibes, some mild body horror?, sponsored by graveyard by halsey and sea by bts, switching POV, takes bits and pieces of the secret ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-27
Updated: 2019-12-15
Packaged: 2020-12-01 21:34:45
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 44,019
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20905865
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dwyndling/pseuds/dwyndling
Summary: The line between dreams and reality is especially blurry for some. Sora dreams. Riku runs. Kairi burns through everything she touches. (Kingdom Hearts looks over it all.) What awaits on the plane where time and death intersect? Perhaps there is no answer beyond oblivion. Perhaps not. Do lost ones await at the nexus of reality? Go and find out, if you can.





	1. Calm Disparity

**Author's Note:**

> I had a blurry mental image of something that made me think "haha that'd be a cool fic" and then I accidentally wrote it. A lot of it. So. Anyway.

The twilight that consumes them is faintly warm at first, but fades into a night slightly too cold to be comfortable. Summer has clearly passed, even if it does not snow on the islands. 

It has been two months since Sora…

Since he…

It has been two months. 

Riku exhales slowly. 

His most tangible connection to Sora, more specifically the chain that linked him to his dreams, has not swayed once in all this time. It hangs slack, dull, and unresponsive, not unlike a phantom limb where the reality of one never really existed in the first place. He continues to eat and sleep and walk around like a man dazed, for the world has gone hazy around the edges. A thick cast of grey has placed itself across his vision, dulling everything his eyes touch into a walking hallucination. It’s as if the muddy, muted world he entered two months ago is an entirely different one than that which he resided in before.

One thing that does not change, which has never changed for as far back as he can remember, is that Riku thinks entirely too much. The superimposed silence that he carries around with him now only enables this habit further, guiding him deeper and deeper within the grey. 

(In what is either providence or cruel irony, the only thing that he registers as being able to cut through the fog he hoists on his shoulders is a certain other pair of ocean blue eyes.) 

Kairi carries herself with the same vacant expression that he recognises from looking in a mirror. It’s as though time has slowed to a halt for the two of them, united in both disbelief and a form of grieving. His thoughts swirl ever onward, but when those ocean eyes meet his, they cool from a mass of hornets into dust motes. 

Her voice is a little less bright, a little more pained. But Kairi always seems to have the energy to muster up a smile for him. 

(It’s hard, and he doesn’t succeed regularly, but he tries to do the same for her.) 

He spends comparatively more time with Kairi now than perhaps he ever did in the past. There are a few welts of guilt that rise up at that particular thought, like perhaps he’s only fooling himself into caring about her for someone else’s sake. 

Riku discards the thought as violently as he can. Two years worth of unsaid things, tamped down thoughts and repressed feelings rise up like a tidal wave in the back of his throat, hard enough that he can almost feel his eyes water. He doesn’t resent Kairi one bit, as much as it would be simpler to. Maybe when he was fifteen, and completely unversed in how to decipher the warring voices that beset him, maybe then he would’ve held it against her. 

As for now...all he feels is grief. If Sora hadn’t done whatever it was he’d ultimately done...then he’d still be in this position. 

The rage that wells up and threatens to rip itself out of his fingers and vocal chords and render itself known in response to the idea that all this was inevitable; that no matter what happened he would lose one of the two people he most treasured…

Kairi understands too much too well. She has her own battle scars, physical and emotional, and while Riku is comforted slightly that she’ll at least have her training to defend herself with, the wildfire that lies waiting in her posture terrifies him. Kairi is not one to back down from a challenge, and an angry, grieving, intensely wounded Kairi is something that makes Riku’s heart ache in regret as much as it terrifies him, both for her sake as for his own. 

(He’d give anything to be able to erase the pain that sits heavy in the back of her eyes.)

Maybe part of it stems from how useless he feels. He’s on an official vacation for now, now that he and Sora aren’t two of the only keyblade wielders to stand between the Light and those who sought to destroy and corrupt it (despite the fact that after the scourge of Xehanort had been expunged, there was very little to do except rebuild and rebirth). It’s as though there are weights tied to his limbs, and his posture cannot help but reflect it. 

(Who is he if not endlessly chasing after his duties as a keyblade master?)

It’s like something within him has ground to a halt, broken down and in need of missing parts. Riku hadn’t expected much of time to do much of anything but turn pain from sharp into numb, and his expectations weren’t incorrect. Insomnia besets him, and the dreams that await him when he does manage to sleep are hardly any better. 

At the very least, he manages to forget most of them when he jerks awake. No matter what, he never seems to dream of Sora. 

(Evidently fate won’t even allow him that grace.)

In a turn of events which he is too miserable to genuinely wonder at the alacrity of, it becomes increasingly common for him to fall asleep quicker and more painlessly when Kairi is burrowed into his side, snoring lightly. Even when he can’t see the piercing color of her eyes, the red of her hair still stands out from the grey, a blood colored lantern in a deep fog. 

These nights are perhaps the ones he looks forward to the most, a simple oasis from the seemingly endless cycles of waking exhaustion and the muted terror of what lies beyond sleep. Usually, they’ll curl up without directly acknowledging it, the conversation staying amidst the shallower, safer waters. There’s a variety of elephants in the room with them that they could pick from if they so chose, but frankly, Riku accepts that the two of them are still far too raw and tender around the edges and in the center to attempt anything as emotionally strenuous as that. 

Nonetheless, the air between them is fairly clear, as clear as could be expected, or perhaps just clear enough. They don’t talk directly about the Keyblade Graveyard, never talk too long about Sora, and only just enough about the year he was asleep. The guidelines are simple, and seem to suit both of them just fine. 

“Riku,” Kairi says often enough, “tell me a bedtime story.”

He does, as much as he knows how. He tells her of the places he’s traveled to, and of the strange and interesting people he’s seen across the breadth of the worlds. Kairi eats up every word, and Riku assures her that soon enough, she’ll have seen them all for herself. They both drop off eventually in this routine, Riku’s style of storytelling frankly putting them both to sleep, but out of either habit or sentiment, he fights off slumber long enough to make sure Kairi is sound asleep first. 

It’s on one of these nights that a change occurs. 

As per the usual, Riku’s thoughts drift to Sora as he falls asleep, still reaching out to the chain in stiff habit. There is nothing there, no dream he can glide into, no shadowy monster to fight in order to wake what is slumbering. 

His whole body aches in sadness, a reminder of his position. 

(Kairi’s arm is clumsily laying over his waist. It is grounding, and an ever present hum of that which he cannot take for granted.)

Helplessness is what most doggedly follows him forward into the world of sleep, a great groaning ache of what he does not know how to achieve. Kairi’s breathing is perhaps the most effective lullaby, and with a sluggish hand, he smooths down her hair as his eyelids blearily slip shut. It is moments like these that most gently ease the pain in his chest, and make him hope that they do the same for Kairi. 

Riku presses a whispered ‘sweet dreams’ into the top of her head, and allows the warm darkness of sleep to claim him. 

However...it is not a dream which comes to him that night.

In bits and pieces, light begins to filter through his eyelids. Riku blinks into awareness, confusedly squinting at the intrusion. Red and gold beam down around him, seperated into polygons and reflecting familiar shapes. His heart station appears everywhere he looks, disjointed in that it doesn’t seem to stick to one surface or direction. The precise images are muted, his vision too blurry to make out the details, but it remains comforting in it’s innate familiarity. 

It’s...warm. 

The chain is jostled. 

Riku reaches for it in a blind panic, limbs moving as sluggishly as they ever seem to do in his own dreams. 

“Sora!”

(Was that even his own voice? He can’t quite tell.)

There is no dream at the other end, he can already tell that. What he can’t tell is if the strange rushing noise that is rising in volume is his own harried breathing or something not arising from him. 

It feels like so long since there’s been any sort of lifelike resonance from his link to Sora’s dreams. He feels...he feels...he feels…

Riku faintly registers that he can hear himself laughing hysterically, without any trace of real mirth. He can see his hands, but they’re uncannily far away from him, pale and discolored in the strange lighting, reaching desperately for any sort of contact through the link. Even if this is a dream...even so…

Maybe if he reaches hard enough, he’ll be able to feel something more, something, anything, even just within a dream-

(He really just wants to see _ his _ face again.)

With no warning, suddenly, the floor has dropped out beneath his feet. With a scream, some garbled mess of Sora’s name and a cry of general panic, all light falls away, and Riku is suddenly swimming in endless darkness. 

Swimming...quite literally; he watches in mingled confusion and terror as his lungs instinctively try to reach for the air for another sound, and the only result is a trail of bubbles gently erupting before his eyes. 

He’s been somewhere like this before...but this time, there is no fellow heart to save him. Inky shadows surround him, and the water is striking a chill directly into his bone marrow. 

Riku allows his eyes to slip shut, all the fight leaving his limbs. It is common for his dreams to end this way, with him finally sinking into the eternal darkness he has escaped by the skin of his teeth so many times before. How cruel...that his dreams have finally learned enough to taunt him with exactly what he wants the most.

If he can’t have Sora...then perhaps oblivion would suffice. He’s intimately familiar with where the edges of darkness surround hearts and worlds, knows the feel and smell and taste of it better than he could have ever anticipated. Dreams are beginning to be the same, the awareness of them upon his senses is familiar by now. 

He’s looked and looked, for any sign of Sora within the darkness, both his own and that of other worlds. He and Kairi both did, returning to the islands each time with heads bowed slightly further. 

Hope, which does not and has never come to him consistently, is dwindling in his heart. He feels fragmented in new ways with every passing day, and with every deep breath it’s a little harder to fit air around the gaping hole in his chest. 

(Riku purposely tries never to think too hard about the span of time where his heart felt as strong as it had ever been. Strong enough to stand between an all consuming deluge of swirling pitch black darkness, and the thing he wanted to protect the most.)

Sora is where he’s always placed his strongest faith, ever since a heart was freed and a door was shut. And Sora…

He doesn’t know where Sora is, and none of his guesses are pleasant. 

...the darkness is increasing it’s pressure on him. The water seeks to bring him to submit, to flush out any foreign piece that cannot be consumed and perverted by it’s endless depths. 

Riku wonders why he hasn’t woken up yet. 

Normally, after the shadows swallow him up, he’ll wake violently, pushing against the subconscious thrill of what it would feel like to be submerged by it again. 

‘Maybe,’ the shadows have whispered to him, ‘if you gave yourself to us, you would find him here. We can help you find him, if only you accept our power as you once did.’

He listens to the voices, as ever, with a patience born of many things. There is only one answer. There will only ever be one answer ever again.

It’s useless to deny that he has wavered. Riku would be flat-out lying if he said that the thought of using the untapped wells of dark frothing rage and sadness to aid him in his search had not occurred to him. The power was mostly dormant, nudging the edges of his self restraint with it’s siren call every now and again. Sometimes, it wears Ansem’s face, other times the face is his own, twisted into a snarl as it reaches for him.

His only response is to turn away. He has spent enough time battling his demons into submission, literally, to know them as well as he knows anyone else he’s loved. 

The dawn is quiet and beautiful, and he would not sacrifice it for anything. 

...alright, that’s a little bit of a lie. He would sacrifice it for Sora in an instant, again, if he didn’t know better by now. Besides, Sora would be so disappointed in him. 

(The last thought has a soft smile attached to it.)

The darkness continues to submerge him, all light drowned out hopelessly. Blearily, Riku registers that at last he seems to be losing consciousness to the pressure, finally skirting the edge of waking. Maybe Kairi is leaning on his chest too heavily. 

When his eyes blink open, it is not to the sight of Kairi snoring softly. Concrete is rough on his cheek. 

Riku stares blankly at the glittering cityscape, radiant under the blanket of night.  


* * *

When Kairi startles awake, it is because the gently rising and falling chest she’d been using as a pillow is missing. 

There is no panic at first, because Riku is an early riser, and Kairi is decidedly not. It’s not uncommon for him to take early morning walks on the beach, usually returning by the time the sun is fully up. 

She yawns, stretches, and sits up with the intent to be productive today. The slight panic begins when she notices his shoes, still neatly over to the side of the door. 

The clock to her right reads half past seven in the morning. Kairi pokes her head out of the door listening intently. It’s a small house, and the walls are thin. After minimal searching, it becomes quite evident that Riku is very much not within the house. 

Adrenaline beginning to buzz beneath her skin, Kairi hastily checks both her Gummiphone and her cell phone. The most recent message from Riku is an image of a green plush frog looking out a rainy window; from a conversation they’d had yesterday. 

Kairi can hear her breathing begin to speed up, heart pounding out a stuttering anthem. If Riku had gone to the beach, he would’ve left her a text, even if he’d left his shoes. If he’d gone elsewhere he would’ve left her a text, and also taken his shoes. 

(It was a habit they’d both fallen into, when it came to light between the two of them that unexplained absence now functions in the same way as a punch to the gut. Leaving notes, checking in with each other at the very least twice a day, those are the patterns that let them both sleep at night, whether they’re curled up against each other or not.)

For Riku...for him to disappear with no word and leave no note...If...if Riku has vanished in...in the same way that…

She lets the Gummiphone in her hand thump down onto the comforter. A dull ache begins to spread through her chest. 

It has to be an accident. He probably just forgot. (Riku never forgets.) Maybe he was in a rush and it slipped his mind? (What on earth would he rush so much for that he hasn’t told her about?) Maybe...he decided it wasn’t worth the effort for whatever reason. (Maybe he doesn’t plan to return.) 

She rejects the last thought with such vengeance that it almost physically hurts. Rage is what besets her next. 

There is purportedly no darkness in the heart of a Princess of Heart. Indeed, it is not darkness which is set aflame in Kairi’s ribcage, but a fire so white and hot she can barely think. The peal of alarm bells rings through her head in the silent room, cleaving her breath in two. 

The soundless panic is not without action for long. With slightly shaky thumbs, she fires off messages to both Xion and Ventus. She directly calls the king for good measure. 

(Xion’s not awake yet but Roxas answers for her, with just enough tact that his great dislike of Riku isn’t _ too _obvious. Ventus replies within the next minute, along with a string of colorful cat emojis crying sparkly tears. She receives a lovely automated response from Mickey which politely informs her he is currently not within Gummi service lines.)

So no luck. 

If someone or something has taken Riku from her as well, to add further injury and insult to injury, then Kairi refuses to be held responsible for her own actions. Destiny’s Embrace is her hands without a moment’s hesitation, and Kairi is two seconds away from opening a portal in her own bedroom when-

“Kairi?”

She whirls around, only to see Naminé, poking her head in with a concerned look. She’s still in her pajamas, her hair a tousled platinum mess. 

Instinctively, Kairi lowers Destiny’s Embrace. “Ah...sorry. Did I wake you?” Her empty hand is balled up into a fist, tucked behind her back to hide how it’s shaking. A dull feeling of pride fills her with how steady she managed to keep her voice. 

Naminé doesn’t seem to be much fooled by it regardless. “Kairi…” She steps into the room, gently closing the door behind her. “What’s going on?”

Kairi bites her bottom lip. “You wouldn’t have happened to have seen Riku this morning, would you?”

Her Other shakes her head. “Was he here?” She steps closer to Kairi, with all the posture of a mouse. 

She can’t help but inwardly roll her eyes. “You don’t need to pretend you didn’t know that.” Naminé has the room next door, and Riku hardly has the most quiet or indistinct footfalls. 

(It’s highly unlikely that Naminé would mind that Riku occasionally sleeps over. Kairi’s father on the other hand…)

Naminé, who misses very little between her own quietude and oddly sharp hearing, smiles faintly. “You seemed to want to be discreet about it.” 

Kairi allows the keyblade to disapparate. “...he wasn’t here when I woke up.” She gestures loosely at where Riku’s boots are primly placed in the corner. 

Not even glancing at the shoes, Naminé sits quietly on the edge of the bed. “And you assumed the worst?” There is no judgement in her tone. Anyone who shared the odd bond formed by spending extended time in another’s heart seem to understand some things a little better than might otherwise be expected; Naminé knows her inside and out. Literally. 

Kairi almost bites out a scathing response, but the tension flees from her spine at the last second. Naminé deserves a more polite answer. “Yeah.” She slumps into a sitting position beside her, posture defeated. 

Ever gentle, the younger of the two takes one of Kairi’s callused hands in her own delicate ones, silent for the moment. When she finally speaks, her voice is barely more than a whisper. “I can’t feel his presence in this world.”

The tension has returned to Kairi’s posture. “Explain.” As an afterthought, she adds, “...please.” 

Despite her best efforts, her lower lip is trembling. 

(Why do her boys seem to have the worst of all the lots in life?)

Naminé squeezes her hand between both of her own. “The path, the connection that ties you to him...it leads into the darkness. I can’t see him anymore.” The girl’s voice, as small and breathy as ever, carries with it an additional note of remorse. 

Kairi stares into quiet blue eyes that perfectly mirror her own. “In that case,” she stands, gently disentangling her hand from Naminé, “I’ll be going.”

There is no question. No more waiting. If Riku has slipped away from her and into shadow, she will chase after him. If Sora fades into the sunlight, she will find a way to follow. Kairi has had her fill of standing on the beach and hoping they’ll come home soon, and safely. 

(It chafes, but her childhood paradise has long been disrupted, and it is a choice of adapting or falling by the wayside. She has tarried at the crossroads for so long, that the path seems longer with every passing minute.) 

But if Sora and Riku won’t stay here with her...

_It’s funny the places that having a big magic key can get you, isn’t it._

Standing too, as if in a panic, Naminé’s voice gains agitation. “Where are you going?” 

She pauses, hand on the doorknob. “I’ll start in Radiant Garden. Maybe the scientists know something.” It’s a bit of a nonsensical answer, but in trying to think of any place Riku might have a special connection to beyond the islands, it’s the first thing to come to her. 

(Even if she objectively knows that Riku’s connection to that place is steeped in pain and regret, it’s not as though she’s overflowing with a multitude of clear options.)

Naminé hurriedly takes the few steps to cross the distance between them. “Let me come too.” Desperation is beginning to form within her gaze.

Kairi turns, forcing a gentle smile onto her face. “No. This is something I’ll do myself. Stay here, and you can let me know if Riku comes back.” The other return she hopes to be notified of goes unsaid, and yet somehow it still echoes loudly throughout the room. 

Expression pinched, Naminé sighs. “It’s no use arguing with you, is it.” 

It leaves a bitter taste in her mouth to have Naminé look at her with a face like that. Kairi turns, slightly ashamed. “Naminé, I…” She hesitates, unsure if the real reason is better left unsaid. 

A sudden smile blooms across Naminé’s face, almost reaching her eyes. “You don’t need to explain. I think I understand.” Her face is tilted down, examining her own clasped hands. “You consider them your responsibility, don’t you.” 

(Does she really think that Kairi would feel the need to hold her own concrete and solid connection to Sora and Riku over Naminé’s head like some kind of taunt? Regardless...the use of the plural just goes to show how truly adept Naminé is at reading her.)

It’s not at all the reason, and she really doesn’t want to have this conversation right now, but…

That does it. Kairi can absolutely not leave her on a note like that. She reaches out, and envelopes Naminé within her arms. There’s a certain unnatural warmth to their embrace, as close a mimicry to the closeness of one heart within another as they can currently achieve, or even would want. 

It takes her a moment further to find suitable words. “I...I need to do this by myself. I promise I’ll stay safe, okay? Won’t even engage any giant heartless on sight this time. I’ll just go to the castle laboratory and come right back.” The part about giant heartless might be a little white lie, but Kairi figures it’ll probably be fine. It was only one dislocated knee last time. 

Naminé ducks her head under Kairi’s chin, winding her arms around the other girl’s waist. “...promise?” There’s a tangible defeatedness in her voice that Kairi doesn’t like one bit, but...but she hopes that even if she postpones that conversation until after she’s found Riku, Naminé will forgive her.

She squeezes her arms a little tighter at it, hoping it’s enough. “I promise.” 

With a tiny exhale, Naminé releases her, face resigned. “Be safe. Please.” There’s a reverence to the way her fingertips trail across Kairi’s wrist in the moment that she let’s go. 

She’s the sister that Kairi never had, her perfect twin in so many ways, and someone so much more than that. They barely need words to communicate, and she hopes that Naminé can see in her eyes how much she dislikes leaving her side. 

Kairi simply nods in response, posture exuding determination, and turns to open the door when suddenly there’s a small tug at her shirt and-

This time, Naminé’s expression is soft, and teasing. “Are you going to change out of your pajamas first?”


	2. Torrid Eclipse

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Riku is confused and Kairi gets the munchies.

There are no people in this town. 

At the very least, that is the conclusion that Riku has come to, after an indeterminate amount of time wandering around, regrettably still in his pajamas. The concrete is very rough on his bare feet.

It’s a little hard to gauge how long it’s been, when the night doesn’t seem to pass even after Riku’s body clock has deemed it’s been several hours. The city glows in multicolored splendour, and he can’t quite tell if the disarming brightness of the lights are disorienting him or if the city goes on forever and he’s not, in fact, hopelessly lost. 

...at this point, he’d put real munny on “hopelessly lost”. His sense of direction is not the finest, but it’s also not the worst, but with such a lack of clear direction, it hardly seems to matter at this point. 

Turning another street corner that he’s nearly positive he’s been round before, Riku stops short. 

The streets around him...are beginning to fill with shadowy figures, flickering in and out of genuine visibility. They move in some strange parody of normality, walking in droves down the sidewalks and across intersections as though the city is heavily populated and bustling as normal. 

Riku accidentally brushes through one of them, and catches a brief glimpse of a woman, middle aged and with a calm expression. Her face flickers out of view in the next instant, a shadow that clumsily maintains a parody of a human silhouette. 

“H-Hello?” He waves at the next one passing by, a harried looking gentleman in his late twenties. The shadow does nothing in response, only lumbering on with a pained expression. 

With increasing anxiety, Riku focuses harder, now staring agape at the veritable sea of faces around him. Young, old, tall and short, they brush past and through him with all the force of a breeze, seeming to either not notice or not care about his presence in their midst. 

They’re nothing more than humble shades of people, and their forms are simply pitiable as much as they are disturbing. 

He wanders into the center of the intersection, which is completely devoid of physical traffic. A few parked cars sit at the edge of sidewalks, but there are no active vehicles in the lanes bustling with warping and twisting shadows. 

It isn’t the technical definition of a ‘ghost town’, but that’s the term that comes most readily to Riku’s mind. 

Warily, he takes stock of his position. Braveheart pulses in his chest, a moment’s wish away. The human-faced shadows seem more like a strange mirage than anything overtly hostile, so his hands remain empty for the time being. 

Riku exhales. 

Now what? Best case scenario, he had some wonky cereal yesterday and is still currently dreaming. However, if he’s to go ahead with the idea that this is not, in fact, a dream, then…

Swallowing around the sudden lump in his throat, Riku adjusts to the realization that if he is actually physically somewhere that isn’t Destiny Islands, then Kairi is alone. And if Kairi is alone…

He’d rather not think about what she’d probably be feeling in that situation. A new sense of urgency washes over him, and in a fit of desperation, he pinches his arm as hard as he can. 

Well, nothing changes, and now his arm stings. 

Riku bites back a yell of frustration. Braveheart comes willingly to hand in the next moment, so that’s one less thing to worry about. Consciously ignoring the shadows that he passes through with every movement, he leaps, focusing on opening a pathway back to Kairi. 

Braveheart twists in his grip, a beam of light shooting forth and forming a keyhole shaped silhouette on the concrete of the road. It expands, radiating forth the strange sigils and patterns that make up a keyhole between worlds and-

Before he even has a chance to dive forward and through it, it melts away at the edges, trailing up towards the night sky in small sandy streams of gold. 

Gritting his teeth, Riku goes through the motions again, pouring all of his energy into focusing even harder on the wish of his heart. The result is the same, the portal appearing as normal for but a single moment, before drifting away into insubstantiality. 

He glides down to rest on his feet, huffing in exasperation. The way the road scrapes at his feet is just an added annoyance. Whatever this realm is, it would appear he’s not allowed an easy way out. 

Braveheart evaporates in his hold, leaving an aftertaste of bitterness. 

The shadows drifting around him, who have paid no mind to his struggle other than to seamlessly continue their sojourn over and around his attempts at a pathway, continue to float through him. Their frozen faces cover the whole spectrum of human emotion, happiness, rage, pain, fear, disappointment, joy, euphoria, despair. He recognizes no one, but they all look human to his eyes. 

A deep sigh envelops his whole being, and Riku soldiers on. He couldn’t say for sure how long he walks among the streets, coursing through simple little back alleyways and straight down the middle of avenues four lanes wide. His feet hurt, but that concern has been outpaced easily by everything else about this situation.

The shadows are everywhere. Out of curiosity, he makes silly faces at some, and they do not respond in the slightest, faces remaining immobile. It becomes a half hearted game, trying to find the most interesting or most intense expression. 

It reminds Riku of something that he might have done with...them. 

He’s in the middle of a very one sided staring match with the shade of an old gent wearing an intensely self-satisfied expression, when he spots him, across the street and down near the farther intersection. 

A boy, of youthful stature and messy hair, gazing gently at him with eyes of sky blue. 

Riku is moving before he even registers telling his body to go, instinctively yelling out the name that constantly hovers in the back of his mind. All other thoughts grind to a sudden halt, and one thought and one thought alone consumes him. 

_ Sora. _

He makes it about halfway the distance between them, when the diminutive figure he’s locked eyes with vanishes, like smoke in the wind, twisting out of visibility and swirling into shadow. 

With the overwhelming swell of defeat hovering behind him and waiting to crash over his head, he can’t quite hold back the desperate noise that rips its way out of his chest and into audibility. A bone deep ache rises with it into conscious pain, and Riku ducks his head to breathe heavily for a moment. 

Only a moment, because in the next, he is sprinting like he’s racing for his life, regardless of what sort of shadowy figure he rips through next. The name rests on the tip of his tongue, but he stays silent, saving his breath for running. He walks down paths he’s positive he’s been down before, retracing his steps and keeping an eye out for new paths, anywhere he might move forward, anywhere he might stand a chance of finding-

_ “Riku!” _

He grinds to a halt so fast he nearly trips over his own feet. “...your majesty?”

Of all the voices he would’ve expected to hear suddenly out of nowhere, he had to admit that Mickey’s was not the highest ranking. 

...however, he was definitely still on the list.

He waits a moment longer, ears straining to hear anything else. 

Nothing ensues. 

Shaking his head in befuddlement, Riku glances around. Is he...hearing things? It sounded so close by…

As he turns to leave and double back the way he came down the main road, a glint catches in the corner of his eye. Pivoting, he squints. There’s some sort of glow, emanating out of the empty alley he’d most recently scoured. 

...well, at the rate things are going, he can’t not look into it. 

He takes the first stride back in that direction, steps slightly slowed by hesitance, and Riku makes his way to the opening, halting just around the corner. Braveheart answers his call in a heartbeat, a comfortable weight in his right hand. With bated breath and his back to the wall, he leans in, turning to look down the alleyway and-

All the breath leaves his lungs. 

Kairi hangs, floating aloft at the very back of the narrow way, suspended in mid air. Her whole body glows with a painful white light, making it hard to look at her. The light ricochets off of her whole form, bouncing off the ground and the buildings, dressing the place in holy radiance. None of the human-faced shadows enter into the brightness, burned away or simply invisible in the touch of the light. 

In his astonishment, Braveheart whisps away into nothingness, and Riku feels his feet carry him forward towards her, spellbound. His lips form her name but no sound arises, breath knocked out of him by the sight. 

“Kairi…” Putting a little more effort into it, this time he hears his own voice say her name like a prayer in the silent alleyway. For some reason, he feels almost afraid to move. 

The wind picks up, and it’s strangely hot against his skin. 

“Kairi...I saw him.” He hears himself make an odd noise, something similar to a sob. “Kairi, I saw Sora.”

(...his common sense is telling him to write it off purely as a hallucination. The Sora shaped voice in his head is insisting that he stop assuming the worst, or in this case, the least.)

She doesn’t respond in the slightest, continuing to hang limp, as if suspended by the light itself. Riku swallows hard around the lump firmly wedged in his throat, and lifts his trembling hand up to touch her glowing cheek. Shaking her seems like a bad idea, for a reason he can’t explain, but that sits as a heavy foreboding weight in the midst of his ribcage. 

The instant his fingers first brush against her burning cheek, Riku is blinded by a blazing light, and knows no more.

_ [1/10 Pure Lights Obtained] _

* * *

Radiant Garden is a little bit more alive every time she’s been here over the past few months. The Restoration Committee has been hard at work, clearing rubble from the streets and erecting makeshift structures where the crumbling ruins of storefronts and houses once stood. 

The castle too looks less drained of life, healthy green vines creeping up the stone, and the dust no longer given a chance to settle so heavily. More people coming and going takes the once silent ruin to something resembling, if not a home or a refuge, then at least a place of community. 

Kairi strides forward with a purpose, boots making a satisfying thumping noise against the stone pavement. The castle rises up before her, an imposing silhouette. 

She ignores the grandeur of it, marching straight towards the side door into the laboratory. The door guards, who seem to have been having a relaxed chat, straighten up at her approach, expressions snapping into their regular ‘neutral consternation’. 

Kairi nods to Dilan and Aeleus, and promptly uses the first order of business to inquire after the easiest of the scientists to talk to. “Is Ienzo here?”

The guardsmen exchange a _look_.

One lengthy trek through an unnecessarily labyrinthian laboratory later, she’s greeted by the sight of the young researcher bent over a massive computer, completely incognizant of the surrounding world. 

When he doesn’t respond to his name after three politely loud attempts, Kairi walks over and tugs harshly on his sleeve. 

Ienzo makes a cut off screeching noise and abruptly snaps back into composure when he sees Kairi. 

“...may I help you?” By the looks of it, the petite scientist hasn’t slept in weeks if the deep burgundy trenches under his eyes (eye?) are anything to go by. 

Kairi, never one to not be forthright, just blinks at him. “You don’t look so good.” 

Ienzo stares back for a moment, before seeming to sigh silently. “I assure you, I am quite well.” Regardless of what task is visibly driving him into the ground, he at least  _ seems _ coherent. 

She internally decides it’s none of her business, and moves on unabashedly. “Has Riku been here?”

The scientist’s expression is befuddled, to say the least. “Not to my knowledge. Should he have been?”

Kairi unconsciously worries her lower lip. “I...no. You’re sure no one’s seen him?”

The visible one of Ienzo’s eyebrows twitches. “I’m sure I haven’t. We don’t get too many regular visitors from off-world lately, but…” He hums contemplatively. “Aeleus and Dilan would be the most likely to know. Have you asked them?” The young scientist’s expression is not unsympathetic. 

She shakes her head, feeling oddly bashful. “No.” 

There is a moment in which the silence stretches out long enough that the contemptuous growl of Kairi's stomach sounds as loud as howl.

Ienzo takes it all in stride. “Well, let’s go ask them then. Have you eaten?” He offers her a smile, and abandons his work at the terminal. 

Kairi blinks in confusion, at both the sudden change in topic and his sudden change in demeanor. “Uh...no.” She watches in befuddlement as he opens a freezer concealed in the wall and offers her a pale blue ice cream bar. 

It dawns on her quite viscerally that she left without eating breakfast. 

...the sheer saltiness hasn’t abated one bit. 

After Ienzo drops her off with the aforementioned guardsmen, Aeleus leads Kairi further into the castle. Neither of the guards have seen Riku, but perhaps Master Ansem might’ve!

(The secondhand recommendations that Kairi has received of the said Master Ansem have all been less than stellar. Indeed, the only person who had spoken of him with anything close to being warmth was Riku, and even that was a bit of a stretch.) 

The castle is hardly small, or easily traversable for the matter, and Kairi easily finishes the bar of ice cream before they reach their destination, tucking the stick into her pocket. There’s a significant amount of walking around piece of crumbling wall, and having to go around and past broken stairwells, and one can’t help but question the structural integrity of the ceiling above them after the sight of a few too many shattered pillars. 

Nevertheless, she can’t deny the impression that at the height of its glory, this was a castle like no other. 

They pass a wide pair of wooden doors, and Kairi catches a glimpse of shelves upon shelves of books, stretching up to the ceiling in multicolored brilliance. She grinds to a halt, time stretching on for an empty handful of moments. 

Aeleus turns to look at her in surprise when her footsteps stop. “Miss…?”

Kairi startles. “Oh! Sorry.” She pivots to catch up with him, but something continues to weigh her feet down to a halt. 

The library whispers to her, not in words, but in fragments, blurry images and faded half-formed memories. 

The guardsman, wether aware of the true nature of her sudden fascination with the room or not, gently eases the doors further open. “...would you like to look around?”

Kairi finds herself nodding eagerly without being completely certain as to why, and the steps that carry her forward and through the doorway are almost a sprint. The library stretches up and around her, towers of books in every direction. Early afternoon sunlight streams in through tall windows, giving the whole place a rosy glow. 

Aeleus seems to be hiding his amusement at her wide-eyed wonder at it. “...if you would like to wait here, I will fetch Master Ansem.” He bows out, leaving the door open a fraction. 

She barely registers him leaving, turning in circles to take in the whole library. 

...it doesn’t make sense as to why this room fills her with such sunny delight, but Kairi soaks it up like sunlight for the moment. A ray of light to pierce faintly through the gloom. 

After wandering the whole perimeter, and what a maze of high shelves this library was, she spots a little nook under the staircase. The light is particularly prominent there, lighting up the simple table and chair that are placed there. It’s the perfect place to sit down with a book, and drink in a well-loved story. 

There’s a sudden throbbing behind her eyes. Kairi’s vision splits in twain, and her hands instinctively come up to cradle her head. What on earth could cause this splitting pain?

...it’s probably all of the dust in here. 

Elsewhere, she hears the creaking of the door opening, and a deep voice inquiring after her. Kairi lifts her head, and leaves the little nook behind her. 


	3. Sobriety Entrenched

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Riku wanders. And wanders some more. A fair amount of wondering takes place on the side.

It is not on concrete that he awakens this time, but instead on impossibly smooth marble floors. 

Riku blearily blinks himself into awareness, shaking his head to attempt to dispel the feeling of mud clogging his senses. The place he has awoken in seems to be a grand golden pavilion, paved with marble and silver, glowing in an unreal light. The whole area seems to leave him with a sensation of floating, dreamlike and beguiling. 

Some parts however, are too real for comfort. 

With mingled surprise and distaste, Riku gazes at his hands. Beginning at the very tips of his fingers and spreading to the knuckles, they’ve been discolored to a pale blueberry shade, subtly unsettling next to the normal rosy tint of the rest of his arms. They don’t hurt, or feel in any way different from the rest of him, so for now this strange new development seems to be purely cosmetic...if that’s any true consolation. 

Riku puts it out of his mind with as much mental fortitude as he can muster, picks himself up, and starts down the first corridor he sees. 

The architecture here seems steeped in classical antiquity, and a chance glance over the edge of a walkway reveals the alarming information that wherever this is lies significantly above the clouds, suspended without any visually obvious support. He inwardly thanks whatever powers are out there that he’s not _ that _afraid of heights. 

There is a golden light that lies deep within the framework of this place, and it feels as though it ought to be soothing, but more and more Riku’s nerves feel frayed at the edges. He hasn’t dismissed the possibility that he’s accidentally slipped into one of his own dreams, and that this is all conjured up within him. 

Continuing in this vein of thought, he attempts a few reality shifts, to the grand result of nothing. If this is a dream, it is evidently not one he’s able to manipulate. 

There’s also the suspicious lack of Dream Eaters to be seen, which ought to be a relief in that there are no obvious Nightmares to fight, but strangely enough it just leaves Riku feeling antsy. He’s in a stabby sort of mood; might as well have something around in need of stabbing. 

There is, in fact, absolutely no one around. This place is a veritable utopia, of heavenly arches and immaculate make. Riku doesn’t even want to _ think _ about how much this place would’ve cost to build. 

...but then again, just from the looks of it, it’s highly likely that no human architect built this place. 

The silence remains all consuming. 

Riku almost wishes that the ephemeral shadows from whatever city he was in previously would appear, just to liven the place up a bit. He wanders for some time, through a vast and white-hot forge, down radiant staircases, and through hallways of golden pillars. The smoothness of the floor is almost completely slick against his bare feet, and it would be a misrepresentation of the facts to say he didn’t slip on any of the staircases. 

Every which way he turns, he looks around for the blue eyed boy he’d spotted, or the blinding white mirage that wore Kairi’s face. Sometimes, his eyes cheat him by placing a figure just at the end of the hallway he’s on, or somewhere off to the side of whatever antechamber or wide room he has yet to cross. It happens just enough to raise his ire furthur, a sharp stinging feeling flooding through him whenever he runs to reach them, and is greeted by nothing at his destination. 

His legs are starting to ache. 

_ “Riku!” _

He starts violently. “Your Majesty?” There it is again…

_ “Riku, go back!” _ The king’s voice is close by, and carrying with it a strong note of urgency. 

He blanches slightly. “Eh? Go back where, exactly?” Nothing good is set to ensue when even King Mickey holds that much panic in his tone, but he’s at a loss for what to do about it.

Besides, if he knew how to go back, he’d have done so already. 

There is no response. 

Sighing through gritted teeth, Riku continues the lonesome meander. Either his mind is playing very detailed tricks on him due to paranoia, or his position is worse than he’d previously assumed. 

(In one of the many grand pavilions he traverses, there is a torch shaped golden sculpture that towers above him. Something radiates off of it, a nostalgia seeped in numbness and pain. He hurries on from that place and tries not to look back. The song with which it calls to him is eerie.)

His steps speed up slightly, the marble faintly cool on his feet. The sooner he can find a way out of here and get home, the better. 

A mirage flickers in front of him, at the other end of a short walkway onto the next open pavilion, and Riku makes a face at it. He’s had just about enough of chasing around shadows for today...even if he’s still very hazy on how much time has actually gone by. 

The mirage pulses again, and he catches a glimpse of sky blue eyes. Squinting, he incrementally picks up the pace again. 

(When there’s a lack of other clear directions, follow the shadowy figures in the corner of your vision who wear the faces of the people you love most...right?)

There! Filtering through from ahead of him, the radiance that fills this place increases, a brighter light streaming down softly and then all at once. The shadow he’s chasing flickers once more, crosses into the path of the light, and vanishes. 

Riku steps with bated breath, out from under the gold plated roof covering the walkway and onto a circular pavilion that opens up into nothing but the air and sky. 

Kairi floats gently, limp as though in slumber, and does not stir in the slightest. Light, pure light, exudes from her like a crystal refracting from every curve, blinding in it’s sheer radiance. Her slack face is the most visible part of her, the rest of her body consumed by light too bright to see through. 

Swallowing hard around the lump in his throat, Riku reaches for her with both hands. 

“Please…Kairi...”

He’s not even entirely certain what he’s pleading for. 

The light claims him again.

_ [2/10 Pure Lights Obtained] _

...this time, perhaps it’s just what he wants to believe, but it feels like a shorter time has elapsed since he lost and regained consciousness. With a start, Riku realizes he’s in Twilight Town. 

Standing, he notices with a wince that his whole body is beginning to ache. Whatever exactly is happening when he comes into contact with that light doesn’t exactly seem to be agreeing with him. 

It’s a hypothesis that, upon accidentally glancing at himself in an empty storefront window, Riku is starting to admit might have a little more credence than he’d like. His skin is near ashen gray, and his eye sockets are flushed in a blueberry color that appears neither healthy or natural. When he lifts a hand instinctively to prod at the skin of his eyelid, it’s with a sinking feeling that Riku realizes his fingertips are almost the same shade at this point. 

...whatever it is that’s happening to him, it hardly seems positive. 

Riku squares his shoulders, and turns away from his disturbing reflection to take stock of his surroundings. Whatever it is that’s making his skin turn odd colors is going to have a hell of a fight to outdo the demons he has already laid to rest. 

Twilight Town lies completely empty and silent, almost faded around the edges. He’s standing at the bottom of the road that leads up to the station, and the clocktower. Riku gives it a long glance, and turns away. 

If there’s something to see here, Riku would bet his bootlaces that it’s at the old mansion. 

...despite the fact that his boots are not currently with him. 

These streets are still familiar to him, perhaps especially so in their quietude. He hasn’t spent much time in this city when it’s bustling, though he can recall Sora texting him excitedly about a new cafe and an open-air movie showing. 

It certainly fits his memories more, to see this place as quiet as a graveyard. He does not dally in the empty streets, but finds himself striding through the forest quickly enough. The only noise is the sound of his footfalls, and for the most part, he hopes it stays that way. 

(If the pale shadows cast by the trees sometimes arrange themselves into a well loved silhouette, hair spiky and mussed by leaves, then that’s a fact that can stay between him and the trees.)

It’s not a long walk, thankfully, and the mansion rises before him with the sense of heavy premonition. He thinks that maybe, the sound of the grass beneath his toes should be making at least _ some _ sort of noise, but the air around him remains mainly undisturbed by sound. 

The gate in front of him swings loosely in a faint breeze that Riku would’ve sworn wasn’t there before. 

_ “Don’t go in!” _

Mickey’s voice again. He whirls around, the sudden sound sharp and ringing throughout the previously unbroken silence. 

Well, there was very little mistaking the meaning of that. Unfortunately…

With a sigh, Riku catches the gate in one hand, stopping it’s lazy swinging. “Your Majesty...I’m sorry.”

For him, the only way that exists is apparently forward. Mickey...he’s sure Mickey would understand.

He closes the gate behind him, but does not lock it. 

The mansion’s door is not locked, and with a growing hunch, Riku stalks unimpeded up the staircase and toward the White Room. He tries to look at the rest of the manor as little as possible, a year’s worth of memories held back by flimsy plastic tape. 

This door is locked. It’s with a growingly irked sigh that he calls Braveheart to hand, and the lock gives way as easily as any normal door against the power of the keyblade, releasing with an audible click of the bolt. 

Riku does hesitate before twisting the handle. To earn King Mickey’s clear panic, it’s quite possible he is up against a dangerous foe. Keeping this in mind, the keyblade stays firmly in hand, his posture held battle-ready. 

As the door swings open, light pours out in enough brightness that Riku hears himself make a grunt of pain, and he turns his eyes away. Overriding instinct, he forges forward, breath held in anticipation of what he’s already sure will be there. 

"Hello...?"

Sure enough, Riku would’ve kept his hypothetical bootlaces. Arranged in some parody of human form, a glowing Kairi sits slumped over in Naminé’s seat at the head of the table. Her cheek is planted firmly against the table, face still unnaturally slack, and her body glows like the sun at midday, white in the place of sunny yellow. 

Even if they hadn’t firmly established their pattern yet, Riku reaches for her without any thought. 

_ [3/10 Pure Lights Obtained] _

This process of blinding nothingness and then a forced awakening seems as though it barely takes more than a few minutes this time. Riku groans into awareness, reaching up to clutch at his aching head. 

He pulls his hands away in a panic when one of his nails slices a neat line into an eyebrow. 

In horror, Riku stares at the unnaturally elongated claws his nails have morphed into. The nails themselves are deep blackberry, barely indistinguishable from his fingers themselves at this point, and the purplish discoloration continues far past his wrist now, fading away at some point before it quite reaches his elbows. The tips are unmistakably sharpened into weapons in their own right, and he can’t help but think they look vaguely reptilian in nature. They’re certainly sharp enough to well be considered dangerous, as the small trickle of blood down his brow bone would testify to. 

With vague macabre fascination, Riku has to forcibly drag his eyes away from the state of his hands and forearms. The world that meets his eyes is not familiar to him, but it appears to be a street in a quiet neighbourhood, currently under the cover of thick grey clouds. It is, as the ones before, completely devoid of life or sound. 

Painfully aware of his nails (claws?) this time, Riku buries his face in his hands. He’s still no closer to home than before. 

...he doesn’t want to think about how long he sits there, in the middle of the achingly empty street. 

“Sora...Kairi.” He mumbles their names into his hands. “I hope you’re...I hope you’re having a better time than this.” 

(He prays this is all just a dream.)

Riku pulls himself to his feet before he can start thinking too much. He doesn’t imagine his objective here will be any different than before, so he simply begins by glancing around for a glowing Kairi. Best to cut straight to the chase, even if this is a world he has no memory of ever visiting before. 

It’s surprisingly easy. An unnatural glow emanates from an open second floor window of the house to his left, and Riku doesn’t even bother with doors, scaling the garage roof with little difficulty. 

(If he faintly hears Mickey warning him again as he pulls himself over the edge of the gutter, he does his best to ignore it, despite the guilt. He can apologize when he’s back, as if Mickey will even care about what Riku says and doesn’t say to him in his own dreams.)

The window is, as he saw, wide open. Riku crouches and ducks through the window frame and is forced to squint his eyes hard in payment for his haste. The light is even more painful to look at than the times before. 

In the back of his eyelids, dancing dots of light smile at him with wide blue eyes. 

Kairi is draped across the bed to his right. Throughout the glare, Riku faintly registers that it seems to be a child’s bedroom he’s broken into, but all guilt of breaking and entering fades away into the background as he forges forward towards her, and reaches out with his bruise colored arms, deliberate trying to make sure he doesn’t catch her with his newly weaponised nails, even if he’s not sure he even could. 

_ [4/10 Pure Lights Obtained] _

When Riku blinks awake next, he is laid out on a forest floor, a gentle breeze dancing over him as soft grass is pillowed under his head. It’s a welcome change from concrete at least. Even if there’s an auspicious lack of the sound wind normally makes when it moves between trees. 

...still not home. 

Quickly, he checks his arms. The unhealthy bluish color hasn’t increased in intensity that he can tell, which is a small comfort in the face of everything else, but a consolation nonetheless. 

The thought of checking his feet for the same ailment crosses his mind. Riku attempts to discard it with a faint sense of disgust, but curiosity wins out. Even with slightly blurry vision, he can see the blueberry tint that grows in intensity starting from the middle of his shins, peaking in saturation at his toes. 

Well.

Riku stands, slowly, as his body cries out in pain. He aches with a ferocious intensity, something that rests deeper than muscles, as if directly in his bones. He only stays upright with the discipline of a warrior, despite the urge to slump back into the soft hill. 

The dewy grass is soothing on his feet, even if it doesn't feel quite real.

He takes in the forest surrounding him. It’s not one he recognises, but it seems peaceful enough, as much as he can tell from the silent version that stretches around him. Little swells and shallow valleys mark the forest floor, terrain gently rolling upwards. 

A small pond shimmers off to one side, and it is then that Riku realizes that for however long and through however many worlds he has wandered so far, he has not once felt hunger or thirst. 

...hmm. That could...be considered evidence towards the idea this is still safely a dream. In the Sleeping Realms, he only ever felt hungry or thirsty in a more spiritual sense, and didn’t feel the absence of food once in all his time there. 

His feet carry him over to the edge of the water curiously, to see it lies as still and reflective as a mirror. 

With a small cry of alarm he bends down, staring at the reflection of his face. The bruise around his eyes has darkened, which is in itself concerning, but it is not that which causes his panic. 

Rosy pink irises glint back at him. 

He catches himself before his hands come up all the way, sharp nails perilously close to his eyes already. Nothing about his vision feels or looks different, but the new color of his eyes shines with a somewhat threatening intensity. 

Numbly, he picks himself up and turns away from his reflection. 

How long he wanders after that, Riku cannot tell. Any hope for Kairi’s image to be conveniently around the next tree begins to gradually fade away, as he walks longer and longer with still no new sign of life or of clear exit. 

Through trees and more trees, up hills and even through a set of caves, he continues to meander. The sense of urgency has quieted to a dull throbbing in the back of his head, and even if he could walk quicker, the ache that he continues to carry with him prevents that. 

It’s only when the treeline finally breaks that Riku is greeted with the sight of more civilization. Across a long bridge, a town rests, by the grace of an island. A castle adorns the top, resting at the height of the hill. On a clear day, he imagines it would be magnificent, but the sky is heavily overcast. No rain has fallen so far, but with the deep coloration of the sky, he imagines it’s not far off. 

_ “Riku. Turn back now.” _

“Mickey.” He really doesn’t know what to say in response. His friend’s voice is slightly disjointed, as though speaking through something that distorts it, and Riku can’t quite decide if that makes it sound closer or farther off. 

“I’m sorry, your majesty. But I have to keep going.”

True to pattern so far, Mickey speaks once, and does not respond. Riku hangs his head with a sigh. 

“Kairi...I’ll be home soon.” He doesn’t quite know why he chooses to voice the thought. Maybe just to break the all-consuming silence. 

About thirty feet away, on the first few steps of the long bridge, a figure dances, a twirling and shifting shadow skipping and swaying down the length of the walkway. 

Riku’s head raises, and feverish rosy pink meets cerulean. 

He dashes, aching body forgotten, in pursuit of the shadow wearing Sora’s face. 

The shade is elusive, spinning away and out of his sight even faster when he attempts to focus on it. The glimpses he is afforded however, are like water on a parched throat. Sora’s features, though unclear, are present in the face of the shade, even while the connected torso and limbs exist in mere wispy shadows. 

As Riku makes the rough pavement of the bridge with a leap, the shade twirls once more and vanishes, and suddenly, the direct way is lit up in blinding brilliance. He stumbles back, righting himself quickly. 

There. 

She is suspended in the middle of the bridge, halfway between where he stands and the island city. 

Riku runs like his life depends on it. He can’t tell if he ever actually crashes into her or if the light claims him first. 

_ [5/10 Pure Lights Obtained] _

Corporate dystopia was not where he anticipated waking up, but for all intents and purposes, that would seem to be the case. The laminate floor does rank above concrete in comfort.

(Gotta look on the bright side, right?)

Riku shakes his head vigorously even with the headache threatening to split him apart, attempting to dispel the inner voice that sounds uncomfortably like Sora. With blackberry limbs, he pushes himself up, meets his own gaze in a window pane, and flinches away on instinct. 

He hardly looks human anymore. So discolored and ashen, if it weren’t for the burning rose eyes, he’d have thought himself a corpse. 

(For a single moment, he cheats himself into envisioning a figure by his side. That cheery grin...he wants to see it. He wants.)

Before his thoughts can spiral too much further at the sight of his own appearance and all the grasping desperate thoughts in his chest, Riku turns away to curl into a ball on the floor. 

...wherever a blindingly radiant Kairi awaits in this assuredly empty world, he hopes she doesn’t mind waiting a minute longer. 

Absently, his eyes trace mindless patterns in irregularities in the floor. It feels good to rest for a moment, the ache that echoes through him abating very slightly. 

All is dead silent for a moment. 

_ “Light burns away anything in its path, exposing all that hides.” _

Riku’s brows furrow. Not only is that an odd thing to say, it doesn’t even sound like something that Mickey _ would _say. 

He responds anyway. “You don’t say.” 

Nothing in return. 

He’s not proud of the broken sigh that echoes out of him as he stands. 

This has been, frankly, _ exhausting _. And if he had to wager a guess, this won’t be the last of it before it’s over. 

Riku contemplates for a moment that this cycle might be infinite. That he might have stumbled into some sort of cosmic loop meant to entrap and delude him. 

(The self-discipline that turns his thoughts away from this spike of panic and off the path to catastrophic thinking was not easily learned.)

As he turns to make his way down the hall, something on Riku’s back begins itching. He ignores it as he takes the next step-

And then a ripple straight up his spine lights his instincts up and he reflexively slaps a hand to the top of his collar. There’s...nothing but skin beneath his hand. (And...now some new abrasions from wickedly sharp nails he’d almost been able to successfully ignore up to this point.)

Well...that’s odd. And probably not good, if it’s going to be on theme for the past however-long-it’s-been. Riku only takes a few moments to decide before steeling himself, returning to the reflective window and hiking up the back of his t-shirt. 

With the appearance of an old faded scar, light pink and slightly raised, his entire back has been branded by the Dream Eater sigil. 

The faint noise he makes at the sight of it echoes faintly in how still the rest of the place is. As he tugs his shirt back down, Riku grits his teeth. Is his status as a Dream Eater what’s causing these physical...abnormalities?

He’s almost afraid to contemplate it too much, and sets theorizing aside for the moment. 

...he needs to find Kairi’s image. That’s what he should be focusing on. 

Luckily for Riku and his increasingly frazzled thoughts, she’s not far. He barely makes it out of the hallway before spotting her, gently stood in the center of a circular room. The large doors leading to the outside show a world at night, rain pouring down, and a small desk sits to the right of where Riku finds himself. 

He notices none of this, instead simply rushing over to her on weary legs. 

Rinse and repeat. 

_ [6/10 Pure Lights Obtained] _

Riku does, in fact, recognise the next world he wakes up in, if only from an overly excited text string of Sora’s. He’d received the messages initially a few days after they were sent, but the warmth and energy of his friend’s tone still came across almost as strong as it later was in person. (Amazingly enough, the Realm of Darkness does not have wonderful Gummi reception.)

The said messages told of a world trapped in ice and snow, a snow queen and her little sister, and of a large...dog? He’s a little fuzzy on the last detail; Sora was sometimes a little incoherent when excited. 

(It’s adorable, to be honest.)

The first tip off: the fact he was laying face down in snow. What was more alarming however, was that it wasn’t cold. 

He sits up, and inspects a handful of the stuff. It’s definitely snow, but there’s no noticeable disparity in temperature between it and his hand. A bit more glancing around reveals he is somewhere in a forest, and that the sky, true to the theme of the last few worlds, is completely clouded over. 

(The white of the snow only highlights how discolored his forearms have become. Lucky for him, emotional avoidance could almost be considered a skill at this point.)

With a grunt, Riku picks himself up, dusting the snow off. It’s when he reaches up to brush it out of his hair, that he becomes aware of his newest...addition. 

Situated above his temples, two hard nubs have made themselves at home. They don’t hurt to the touch when he prods at them. 

...horns. 

He swallows hard around the sudden rock in his throat. The true fear of what might be happening to him begins to sink in deeper, and when Riku curls his hands into fists, his nails slice at the skin of his palms. 

On this strange journey, he has not cried yet, but tears prick behind his eyes. 

A glint catches in the forming tears. He spins, nearly slipping in the wetness of the snow. Further up the slope white light pours through the treeline, forcing him to squint even at this distance. 

A figure stands in the shadow of one of the trees, beckoning him with softly smiling azure. 

As if he carries his own mountain on his back, Riku begins trudging up the hillside. 

_ “Riku. If you continue, you will burn away to nothingness.” _

He doesn’t bother to respond to whatever it is that is using Mickey’s voice. He passes the tree where the shade of Sora was standing just a few moments ago, and gazes into the clearing beyond. 

“Kairi.” His voice, no more than a whisper, feels as loud as a yell amid the silence. 

She’s almost bent over backwards, hair falling away from her face to display her sleeping, frozen in limbo. 

The tears begin to fall as Riku trudges over to her, stinging his eyes. When he reaches to touch her illuminated cheek, he trips, headfirst into the light, and the tears are immediately cut short. 

_ [7/10 Pure Lights Obtained] _

Riku awakens dry-eyed. 

...to the sight of bangs significantly longer than he remembered letting Mickey cut them. 

He sits up in a sandy panic, and the feeling of weight from his head almost sends him down a dark spiral out of the past, the likes of which he hasn’t seen in some time. 

With trembling claws, he lifts a piece of his hair, his hair which now spills down the full length of his back and then some. It’s almost pure white, glinting pale silver against the navy of his hand, and Riku bites down on his bottom lip. 

...what on earth is he becoming? 

He finally takes stock of his surroundings. He’s on an island, that much is certain. It’s not Destiny Islands, that’s also for certain. 

It sends prickles of fear and discomfort down his aching spine that the ocean makes no sound as it laps against the shore. 

Riku stands, surefooted and barefoot on the sand. The sight of the ocean itself is a comfort, even in the face of _ literally everything else _. 

(He allows himself a sigh in the gaping silence, and for once, this one almost feels like relief.) 

As he walks down the vacant shoreline, he absently ties his hair back into a braid so it stays out of his face. He has nothing to secure it with, so he just loops the end of the braid around itself in a simple knot. It’s a somewhat harder task since he keeps accidentally poking himself with the claws, but eventually it’s out of his vision. 

(The beginning nubs of horns at the crown of his head are even pointier. Riku tries not to think at all.) 

_ “You are nothing more than a pathetic shadow. You will perish in the touch of True Light.” _

Riku sticks his tongue out at the empty gray sky. Whatever knows enough of him to use Mickey’s voice to speak to him with isn’t smart enough not to underestimate him, apparently. Nothing it can say to him could possibly be worse than things he’s thought to himself at one point or another. 

The sky is not overcast for once, but the light from the sun is weak, and seems almost negligible entirely. The ocean looks more gray than blue, and when he crouches down to run his discolored hands through the surf, it barely even feels wet. 

What kind of world is this? If not dream, and if not reality...what has he entered? 

Claiming for himself a small respite, Riku flops down with his purple toes in the not-quite-ocean, and decides it’s finally time to start thinking. 

...where even to begin. 

He cranes his head back to look at the muted sky. It’s undeniable that he is making progress at _ something _, even if it’s only the gradual mutation of his body. Riku grimaces. It’s not a nice thought, but he can deal with it. At least he still looks like himself this time...for the most part. 

There should be a glowing Kairi somewhere in this area as well, but he sets that aside for the moment. He needs to take stock of his options at some point, and here, on an island that at least bears a very vague resemblance to home, is good enough. 

What does he know for certain? He knows he went to sleep with Kairi cuddled to his chest and thoughts of Sora on his mind. He knows his whole body aches and groans with a vengeance, along with the unpleasant changes to his appearance. 

…he knows he keeps seeing Sora, in shadows, in the corner of his eye, feeling him in the back of his heart.

A sigh whispers it’s way out of his lungs. Maybe it’s just his heart taunting him with what he most wants to see...or maybe it’s something else entirely. 

He has no way of knowing. Among the silence, there’s no way to get answers other than to mindlessly keep going. And the price of that, it would seem, is whatever is causing his body to...to…

(He can’t think too deeply about that or he’s not going to be able to go on.)

With a deep breath, Riku speaks into the nothingness. “Kairi...I want to come home.” His voice gets louder. “Sora, I want to find you and bring you back.” 

He lays himself down in the sand, the ocean brushing up past his ankles. “I...I’m sorry. I must’ve left so suddenly.” When tears threaten to break past the surface again, he bites down hard on his lower lip. It hurts, to feel so far from home, when he’d barely gotten used to staying on the Islands again. 

It hurts...to feel so far from them.

(Again.)

There is a love that burns within the very essence of who he is, a light that shines so bright he could face any darkness or oblivion. A love...a certain kind of love that’s blessed only for Sora and Kairi. 

In truth, he doesn’t know how not to love them. It’s always been there, in the back of his mind. Even when he was at his lowest, when the darkness claimed him for it’s own, it was there, hidden away and mostly unacknowledged, but a brilliant little lantern on a storm’s night. 

Riku loves them to pieces; loves them with his whole being. His dearest friends, his…

It’d be a lie to say he hasn’t thought beyond friendship. Sora is a bundle of all things wonderful and free, with eyes that shine like the sky on a sunny day. Kairi is a classic beauty, with a mile wide playful streak and all the grace of a flower. He can’t help but imagine what it’d be like to press a kiss to ever knuckle of Kairi’s newly callused hands and watch her flush prettily, or to press his face up to Sora’s and count his freckles with eyelash kisses while Sora giggles. 

As if from far away, Riku wonders if he’s blushing, and if that blush is another macabre shade of purple. 

...he’s well acquainted with the idea that this will probably all have to remain a secret. Having...non-platonic...feelings for one of them would be enough to cause stirs and potential tears within their dynamic, let alone both of them. 

Riku’s made his peace with that. There’s also the fact that Sora...that Sora…

Well. Sora won’t be gone for much longer as long as Riku has his wits about him. He doesn’t know how, not in the slightest, but he’ll do it.

He sits up from reclining in the sand. It’s about time he was on his way. 

If he sees a faint figure standing near where he had lain, a figure that reflects the true color of an ocean through their eyes, Riku does nothing as he turns away, even as the melancholy shapes itself into a tiny smile. 

It’s not hard to find Kairi’s likeness, as the island he’s on is quite small, not too much larger than the play island back home. She is nestled between two palm trees, glowing so bright that Riku can barely distinguish the features of her face anymore. 

He thinks maybe his heart breaks a little in pain as he reaches to embrace her.

_ [8/10 Pure Lights Obtained] _

* * *

_ It’s warm. _

_ The air itself is like a lullaby, warm and heavy and thick like honey. It seeps into your bones, lulling you further and further away from any trace of awareness. _

_ ...you could dream forever in a place like this. _

_ Clouds are so soft! They’re fluffy and bouncy like a pillow. _

_ ...I was doing something. _

_ …...Looking...for someone? _

_ Hmm...probably not important. _

_ But I can’t shake the feeling… _

_ ...what’s my name? _

_ It’s probably not good that I’ve forgotten _ that, _ of all things. _

_ ...maybe I’ll remember if I lie here a little longer. _


	4. sumire

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kairi’s path is laid with unexpected encounters and food. Mostly unexpected encounters.

After a long, boring, and thoroughly unhelpful conversation with Ansem the Wise, Kairi stalks out of the castle with her chin held high. The only information she really considers relevant is that no one’s seen Riku here, which leaves her without immediate options for the most part. 

(The words of the scientist are still bouncing around in her mind. She forces it aside for now.) 

Currently, she’s seated in the back of a small garden that’s been set up, to grow medicinal herbs from what she can tell. No one will bother her here, mostly because she’s all but invisible behind the rows of tall brushery gently arranged where they can flourish. 

(Miss Aerith, who recognised her on sight as she was leaving the castle, had already pulled her inside to give her a thermos of tea for the road, and tell her that she hasn’t seen Riku since the time he and Kairi had last been in Radiant Garden together. She’d also unlocked the garden gate for her, and frankly, Kairi was two seconds away from falling in love with her at this point.)

She chews on her lower lip, staring at the Gummiphone in her hand. 

_ [10:36] nams _ _ ♡ _ _ :  _ Any luck?

_ [10:37] Me:  _ nope. no one’s seen him. 

_ [10:37] nams _ _ ♡ _ _ :  _ I see. 

_ [10:37] nams _ _ ♡ _ _ :  _ Should I call the king?

_ [10:28] Me:  _ nah, i tried that already. he didnt pick up. 

_ [10:28] nams _ _ ♡ _ _ :  _ Are you coming home now?

_ [10:30] Me: _ i talked to the scientists. we went over some stuff about hearts and crap

_ [10:30] Me:  _ i think,,, i’m going out among the worlds to look for riku. 

_ [10:31] Me:  _ someone else may have seen him, u kno?

_ [10:31] nams _ _ ♡ _ _ :  _ Have you checked with all the other guardians yet?

_ [10:33] Me:  _ no, but he’s not at master aqua’s place or in twilight town,,, that we know of

_ [10:33] Me:  _ maybe i’ll go there or smth

_ [10:33] nams _ _ ♡ _ _ :  _ Shall I call Master Aqua to tell her of your arrival?

_ [10:34] Me:  _ nah, its fine

_ [10:34] Me:  _ actually 

_ [10:36] Me:  _ could u maybe not mention this to anyone?? 

_ [10:36] nams _ _ ♡ _ _ :  _ Kairi, what are you planning?

Maybe it’s a long shot...but perhaps she can find him on her own. Kairi feels her mouth harden into a line. 

However...whether the other wielders will think that is another story altogether. 

(She can already see it now, Yen Sid giving her a stern look and telling her that some other, more capable keyblade wielder will take up the search for the missing Master.)

_ [10:37] Me:  _ i’m gonna go look 4 him. it’s fine, dont bother anyone else abt it, k?

_ [10:38] Me:  _ obvs tell them he’s missing, but,,,, can u not tell them i’m out looking for him? or at least,,, don’t say where i am.

_ [10:39] nams _ _ ♡ _ _ :  _ On one condition. 

_ [10:40] Me:  _ yeet?

_ [10:40] nams _ _ ♡ _ _ :  _ You keep  _ me _ updated of your location. Then I’ll agree to your terms.

_ [10:41] Me:  _ deal!!

...she’d best be on her way then.

Kairi pockets her Gummiphone, and exits the garden. She leaves the now empty thermos carefully by Aerith’s door, and resolves to write her a thank you note.

Wherever her connection leads...she’ll follow it. If Riku is among the worlds, he won’t evade her for long.

Uncaring of what civilian stares she may or may not be attracting, world order be damned, Kairi calls Destiny’s Embrace to her hand, and focuses on Riku. 

_ A pillar of strength. Dependable. Keyblade Master! Worry-wart. Gentle. Gives excellent cuddles. Chronic overthinker. One of her best friends for so many years now...despite the ups and downs. _

_ Something...a little bit more?  _

Kairi’s thoughts take a significant detour at that, and with a sharp tug, she pulls them back by the reins. Now is not the time for day-dreaming about Riku’s muscles, or his silvery hair or his soft teal eyes or his-

Anyway. 

_ Riku...where are you? _

A beam of light radiates forward from the tip of her keyblade, and Kairi allows herself to exhale as a portal forms. She’s not the best yet at forming a portal based on a connection to a person so much as a world, but she had at least been taught the theory of how. The portal that forms is steady enough, and it’s with a vague sense of relief, and accomplishment, that she dives into the light. 

When her feet touch down on the other side, it’s in a city, built from stone and bustling with people. The people here are dressed in robes, and it doesn’t appear to be a very technologically advanced world, judging from the plain wooden stalls and evident lack of public transport.

Kairi absentmindedly banishes Destiny’s Embrace and starts trekking forward. It would appear to be early in the afternoon, and the sky is blue and bright. No one pays her much mind amidst the hustle and bustle, and she finds herself oddly grateful for the newfound sense of anonymity.

The market is well-sized, but Kairi wanders out of it soon enough, and down through the rest of the city’s gardens and stairways. It seems to be in the process of being rebuilt, as if some natural disaster broke apart giant pillars and crashed through towering buildings. 

(Distantly, she wonders if Sora has ever been to this world, amid the myriad of others he claims to have been at one point or another.)

No one really attempts to speak to her beyond getting an occasional hail from a merchant selling their wares as loudly as possible, and Kairi eventually finds herself perched at the edge of a terrace overlooking the market, resting her legs for a moment. Asking around for someone of Riku’s description yields nothing, except some mingled confusion, and nowhere does she see any trace of keyblade wielders. For all her efforts...

There’s still absolutely zero sign of Riku.

“Pffffttt…..” She exhales as loud as she can. Maybe she assembled the portal incorrectly? It felt right, but then again…

“Are you lost kid?”

Kairi’s head whips around, to the sight of a young woman looking down at her inquisitively. She’s dressed the same as the people in the market, wrapped in violet fabric with her auburn hair piled on the top of her head.

As Kairi’s silence goes on a few beats too long, the woman smiles pleasantly, even as her eyebrows quirk up in bemusement. “Forgive me for assuming, but you don’t dress like you’re from around here.” 

She finds her voice in the next breath. “Ah, right! Sorry, yeah...I’m from...other...places.” She inserts a soft grin at the end of that and hopes she doesn’t sound  _ too  _ awkward.

(What? It’s not Kairi’s fault if she occasionally gets flustered around pretty girls who are smiling at her. Doesn’t everyone?)

The woman’s smile turns crooked, and Kairi’s heart beats even faster. “Other places, huh? Isn’t everyone.” Her gaze turns from Kairi to look down at the market below them. “What brings you to Thebes?” She seems to simply be making light conversation as opposed to suspecting Kairi of anything, but then again, sometimes you can never tell.

With “world order” resting in the back of her mind in Yen Sid’s voice, Kairi simply smiles. “I’m here looking for a friend of mine. He’s gone missing...and I’m going to bring him home.”

The lady nods. “I wish you luck then. What’s he look like? Maybe I can ask around for ya.” Kairi finds herself being regarded with piercing orchid eyes, and desperately quells her fluttering heart. 

Instead, she stands, leaning over the terrace railing to watch the vendors below. “He’s two heads taller than me, with short white hair...and dresses in grey and blue.”

One of the woman’s eyebrows arches. “Don’t know anyone of that description myself...but I’ll keep my eyes peeled.” She glances over Kairi up and down. “What’s your name kid?” 

“I’m Kairi! My friend’s name is Riku.” Another name hovers in her throat, but she keeps it there, tucked away. 

“Kairi and Riku...interesting names.” The lady casually balances her elbows on the railing. “Call me Meg.”

She smiles brightly. “Nice to meet you, Miss-” 

Kairi finds herself cut off by the lady shaking her head. “Drop the ‘Miss’! You’ll make me feel old.”

She can’t hide the giggle, and Meg makes a teasing face at her for it. “Just Meg then.”

“Better. Now, Kairi.” Meg’s considering stare is back on her. “You never answered my first question. You lost?”

“Heh…” Kairi hesitates. She’s not lost per se...simply unknowing of where to go next. “I guess you could say that. I don’t know where to look now...I couldn’t find Riku at all in this city.”

Meg’s expression is sympathetic. “Well...if you’re intent on still going after him, I can give you a map for the road. I warn you though, it’s not the safest to go alone.”

It’s highly unlikely that the said map will be of much help once she leaves this world, but Kairi still feels grateful for the offer. “Ah, thank you, but I already have what I need.” 

The appraising look that Meg gives her isn’t soft, but it feels honest. “...you know what? I think you do too, kid. Your friend should feel good that he has someone capable out looking for him.”

Kairi blinks. It’s...it’s one of the first time she’s ever heard something like  _ that _ . 

“I...you really think so?” If her tone is a bit more desperate than perhaps is necessarily polite for casual conversation, it’s not at all at the forefront of her mind. 

Meg gives her a lazy thumbs up. “Yup. It’s written all over your face. You got this.”

There’s a sudden lump in Kairi’s throat, and numbly, she gazes down at the market without really seeing anything. 

_ Your friend should feel good that he has someone capable looking out for him.  _

Someone like her...looks capable?

_ You got this. _

Kairi can feel her bottom lip start to wobble a bit, and quickly turns to look at Meg. “Mm! Thank you for saying so!” 

It feels as though she’s been handed a flower, glittering faintly and filling her with something soft and wonderful.

Meg’s gaze stays on the bustle below, but her face creases into the same crooked grin. “Just telling it how I see it.” She looks up, and Kairi feels that the sparkle in Meg’s eyes must be reflecting in her own right now. “You know...you remind me of someone. A kid who comes through here from time to time...always out to save his friends. He’s got that same look to him.”

_ Oh.  _

There’s a whole variety of things that rise up in Kairi’s chest at that, and dissecting each separate one is impossible at the moment. “O-oh? Meg...could you tell me that boy’s name?”

“Let’s see...Sora. Sora, that’s his name. Spiky little fighter that one.”

The ground stays exactly where it is, but Kairi can absolutely feel it falling away from beneath her feet. “Sora…” She feels pride that she doesn’t stumble on the familiar syllables of it.

(Over the past two months, the difficulty of speaking his name altered drastically. Some days, it feels as though she’ll see him if she just says it enough, if she chants it like a mantra. Other days, it’s something far too sacred to dream of ever saying aloud.)

Meg is watching her curiously. “Do you know him?”

She nods slowly. “I...yes. I know a boy named Sora.”

_ It fills her with a warmth to know he has been here. To know his achievements and his personality do not lie unremembered. _

_ But of course! Sora makes friends everywhere he goes. _

_ ...if only those chains of light were enough to bring him back. _

Meg opens her mouth to respond, but before she can do so, someone calls her name from the other end of the pavillion. Kairi glances up with her, to see a tall young man waving his disproportionately muscular arms at her in excitement.

With a smirk, Meg stands up straight. “That’s my cue.” She gives Kairi one last look. “Shall I see you round, kid?”

_ When this is all fixed and as it should be, I’ll come back. I’ll bring Sora and Riku with me as well.  _

Kairi nods firmly. “I’m sure we’ll bump into each other again.”

_ I’ll make it so. _

Meg seems satisfied with that. “Then I’ll catch you then. Good luck, Kairi.” And with that, Meg strolls off towards the young man.

She only hesitates at the railing a moment longer. 

_ I’d best be off as well.  _

And with that, Kairi sets off down the stairs and back into the market. 

She makes her way through the streets with somewhat more purpose this time, aimed to get outside of the city, or at least out of sight. She’ll attempt the portal again to see where it leads, and focus even harder this time. 

A glint catches in the corner of Kairi’s vision. She glances over, into the alley opening she’s just passed, not seeing anything at first, until-

In the corner a few yards away, almost completely hidden against the stonework of the wall, is a jetblue crown. Not a real crown, but specifically a crown-shaped charm. 

A very  _ familiar _ crown shaped charm.

She darts over to it in a flurry, and reverently reaches down to scoop the charm up and-

It immediately disintegrates when her fingers brush across it, evaporating up into misty little dark blue strings of sand.

_ [1/10 Shadow Fragments Released] _

It leaves a hollow ache in her chest, and Kairi numbly stares down at her empty hands. She stands, brushing her knees off without really thinking about it, and turns to leave. 

Or, she would have, if not for the sight of pants far too wide legged to be practical for combat. Specifically, if not for the sight of Mr. Terra, calmly wandering the marketplace thirty feet away.

Kairi ducks behind the cover that the alleyway affords, peeking out to stare after him. He doesn’t seem to have noticed her, nor does he seem to be intent on doing much of anything other than idly browsing through the market vendors.

Her hand balls into a fist. She could approach him...ask for his help…do this with the aid of a keyblade warrior far more experienced than she...

...and Mr. Terra could just as easily tell her to go back home, a dull reminder that  _ apparently  _ she’s not good enough to be given anything important to do.

Something splinters in her.

Destiny’s Embrace comes gladly when called, and in the shadow of the alleyway, Kairi jumps, focusing on Riku with all the furious pent up energy inside her.

_ Riku. I’ll find you.  _

_ ...just as you’ve helped me before. _

The light splashes across the alley walls with vengeance, and Kairi dives into the portal before anyone has a prayer of stopping her. 

_ I’ve got this. _

For a change of pace, when the light clears around her, Kairi is greeted with the more familiar streets of Twilight Town. It’s hard to gauge the time by the sky here, but it feels like early afternoon, as the bistro across the way is still advertising their breakfast special. 

She’s half tempted to go see what the special is, but the more urgent matter retains dominance in her thoughts. Amidst the people currently in the streets, no one immediately stands out with a shock of silver hair.

...hmph.

Kairi begins walking forward, pulling her hood up just in case.

This is Roxas and Xion’s turf after all, and while she’s sure Xion would be sympathetic, Roxas would probably be just fine with Riku staying missing. It’d be simpler just not to involve them.  As for Axel, well, he’d either send her straight home, or try to accompany her. They’re about tied for likelihood in her head, and Kairi’s not about to chance it.

She doesn’t see anyone she knows yet, and furthermore, she doesn’t hear Roxas yelling, which is usually a fairly good indicator of his location. Nevertheless, the hood stays up.

...hmm?

There on the tram tracks, is another crown charm, glittering faintly. Kairi pounces, only to the same disappointing results. 

_ [2/10 Shadow Fragments Released] _

The sight of it wisping away so easily leaves a bitter taste in her mouth.

_ Tch...what are these things anyway? _

“Kairi!! Hey, Kairi!”

_ ...crap.  _

She turns around, plastering on what she hopes is a convincingly casual smile. “Hi?”

Olette is grinning down at her. “You’re here!”

_ Worst case scenario averted! _

She stands, somewhat enthused. “Mm! Just passing through, unfortunately. Hey, by the way, have any of you guys seen Riku?”

Olette frowns. “Riku...can’t say I have. Was he supposed to be here?” Her head tilts to side in concern.

Kairi smiles wanly. “No, not really. He’s...missing.” 

Eyebrows furrowed, the other girl instinctively rests a hand on Kairi’s arm. “How long?”

She tries to make her expression turn reassuring. “Just this morning. I’m sure I’ll find him soon!”

_ Olette theoretically knows about keyblades. Olette could probably make a well educated guess that Kairi’s not from this world at all. But still… _

_ Best not to shake the boat  _ too  _ much. _

Olette seems to accept this easily enough. “I’m sure you will! He’s probably just run off to brood somewhere. You know how boys can be.” Her face creases into a teasing grin.

Not that far away, much too close to comfort, Roxas crows in delight. The impact of wheels hitting the ground sounds harshly against the early afternoon ambiance. 

_ …...shit. _

As the other girl is already turning to meet him, lifting her arms in greeting, Kairi abandons dignity by the wayside and  _ dashes. _

_ I’ll apologize later...to Roxas  _ and  _ Olette. _

_ After I find Riku. _

It would appear Roxas hadn’t noticed her in the rush of whatever skating trick he’d recently accomplished, and Kairi takes the small blessing. Roxas could absolutely beat her in a flat-out dash, but thankfully, he’s just a little bit too oblivious this time.

She finally stops to catch her breath when she’s safely in the tunnels that lead out to the woods. She could check the mansion…but something tells her that even if Riku has simply run off to brood as Olette suggested, it wouldn’t be  _ there _ .

Kairi raises Destiny’s Embrace with a huff. Is this even working? Well, she’s definitely landing in distinct worlds...so that has to be something...right?

_ Riku. Where have you left me behind for this time? _

The portal forms, even more seamlessly than than the times before, and Kairi plummets into the welcoming light. 

She lands...in a place she’s never been before. She lowers her hood with curiosity, glancing around. 

Now, it’s not that Kairi has never seen a toy shop. But never such a big one. Never one even taller than her house.

Eyeing it curiously, she finds her attention drawn by the establishment next door. It seems to be some kind of extension of the toy store, but rather than a shop, the signage clearly indicates it’s some sort of arcade.  _ “Slushies 50% Off From 6-9”  _ one sign reads, while another clearly advocates for some sort of video game. 

The moody looking character on the sign stares coldly down at her, and, just to be contrary, she sticks her tongue out at it. She has enough  _ real  _ silver haired boys emotionally compromising her not to need the fictional ones.

...if this is where Riku has slunk off to, to brood and/or play video games, Kairi’s going to be royally pissed. 

She approaches the automatic doors with all the rage of a rampaging titan- 

_ …!!! _

-and the very instant they slide open, she pivots to leave. 

With gusto, her arm is grabbed by the very specter that caused her to attempt to turn and flee, and a black nailed hand drags Kairi furthur out of the store and into an adjoining alleyway. She’s unceremoniously flung into the deep end of the alley and left to right herself, backed into a corner.

Her hand twitches for Destiny’s Embrace, but doesn’t summon it yet. 

“You’re the one they call Vanitas.”

The boy wearing Sora’s face looks down at her, lip curled the slightest bit. “Congrats. You want an award for getting that much?”

Kairi feels her eye twitch. “What do you want.”

Vanitas is staring her down, uncowed by the anger she’s sure is on her face. His features, painfully familiar, twist into a scowl. “You’re not going to be taking me anywhere.” 

Even from the yard or two that separate them, Kairi can see his teeth gritted. He hasn’t summoned his own keyblade yet, which hopefully means she can exit this confrontation without violence.

(Is she in the mood to beat something up? Yes. Is she in the mood to beat up someone with Sora’s face? No, not really. She’s not above admitting that. If Vanitas tries to hold that above her though...her mind could be swayed.)

Kairi tries to make her posture relaxed. “...I didn’t come here looking for you.” In trying to keep her voice even, she sounds indifferent to her own ears.

That evidently does not sit well with Vanitas. His (red, oddly enough) eyes flash, and he takes a step towards her. “Shut it. I know you lot would get troublesome if you found me. I’m not in the mood to  _ talk. _ ” His expression morphs into something much more self-assured. “Doesn’t matter. You couldn’t subdue me even if you wanted to.” 

Hearing Sora’s voice with that rasp is jarring. Kairi blinks rapidly, and forces herself to focus. 

...hmm. Vanitas is wearing...normal clothes. Human clothes. Sure enough, he’s still dressed all in black, but this time it’s jeans and a t-shirt...and an ill-fitting grey jacket. It occurs to her to wonder what exactly it was that happened to him...between now and being defeated in the graveyard.

That stupid chin guard is also missing, which means his face is laid out, bare and unobscured.

_ Sora. Come back to me. Anyway you know how. How do I find you? _

He seems to take her lack of response badly. “Oi. You even listening?” He waves a mocking hand in front of her face.

She huffs out a breath. “I’m not here to fight you. I’m here looking for someone el-”

A black and red keyblade is suddenly pressing her up against the back of the alley wall. Vanitas’s face is a lot closer than it was before. “Don’t play games with me,  _ princess _ . It won’t go well for you.”

Kairi feels her teeth grind together. “I’m. Not. Here. To. Fight.”

They must be wearing matching expressions of anger at this point. The keyblade is an unforgiving weight against her chest. Vanitas’s crimson gaze is narrowed harshly. “...and why should I believe that.” 

She squirms, ineffectual. “Why would anyone send me to find you anyway?” She presents him with a joyless grin, baring her teeth. “You said it yourself. I couldn’t subdue you if I wanted to.” 

(She doesn’t want to believe that. Wants to face down an opponent with the same fearless abandon that Sora employs. Wants to walk into combat with the graceful calculation that Riku embodies with every step. Wants to be anything other than a dead weight. Anything other than a weak, useless, pathetic-)

But for now, her legs dangle helplessly. The pressure on her ribcage is making spots appear in her vision.

Vanitas sneers. “Damn right. Did they even train you before throwing you into the ring? I heard the old man skewered you like a pike on a spe-”

With passion, Kairi kicks as hard as she can, and lands her boot directly between his legs. 

He makes a noise like a newly beached whale, and the keyblade against her chest vanishes quite suddenly. They both fall in a tangle of limbs, and Kairi darts, around so that now he’s the one cornered, crumpled on all fours, and she has Destiny’s Embrace leveled directly at him.

Vanitas hisses, not completely unlike a cat. “Damn...you…” His keyblade reappears in one hand, and he manages to push himself halfway up again with it, face pinched. It flickers out of existence in the next moment and he’s back on all fours, making a noise that doesn’t really qualify for description.

Kairi stares him down. “I’m not here to fight you.”

Their eyes meet. Ocean blue cooly regards disoriented crimson.

She takes a deep breath. Frankly, she really does neither want nor feel a need to fight him. Whatever quarrel he has with Ventus is currently none of her concern. Not until Ventus truly needs or asks for help with this. 

(Her blood is racing, spikes of adrenaline coursing through her. It feels good, it feels  _ right _ to stand like this, on her feet against a cowed opponent.)

And yet...

Kairi allows Destiny’s Embrace to disapparate, and bends down, extending her hand to him. “Come on. I’ll buy you a slushie if we promise not to fight today.” She does not smile in the slightest.

He’s a pitiable sight, curled around himself and glaring up at her with a vengeance. 

(She hopes he can see the lack of pity in her eyes.)

For a moment, he genuinely looks like he’s prepared to bite her hand off at the wrist. The moment after that, he looks more like he’s contemplating directly turning into a pile of goo on the spot. 

Miraculously, Kairi’s hand stays attached to her arm. Vanitas bats it away with enough impact to sting, and gets to his feet ever-so-slowly.

Kairi holds her breath. 

“...I only like strawberry. If you even breathe a  _ word  _ of this to anyone-” and suddenly the black and red keyblade is menacing her in the face again- “-you’re dead. Do we have a deal?” He grinds his ultimatum out from between gritted teeth, and his odd red eyes are practically shining.

It’s quite possibly the most intense expression she’s ever seen him make. 

...not that she’s seen that many. 

Kairi nods dumbly, and the keyblade is withdrawn. She turns slowly to exit the alley, Vanitas on her heels like a particular violent shadow, and ultimately pays for the slushies with a mingled sensation of disbelief and surprise. It’s a damn good thing the money she has in her pocket works on this world. 

They somehow end up on a bench within the toy store itself, and the crisp sensation of a bubblegum slushy in her hands is enough to jolt her out of the amazed stupor. She chances a nervous glance over at him.

Vanitas eats the slushy like he does almost everything else, highly motivated and with an unnecessary amount of aggression. He’s shoveling it into his mouth with gusto, as though it’s the only thing he’s eaten in days, and Kairi wonders vaguely if it is. Just from...everything about him...he doesn’t seem the type to be above petty crime if he was in the mood for it, and his survival instincts seem to be at least somewhat higher than average.

Or on an entirely different measurement scale maybe.

(Despite the fact that she had an ice cream bar not  _ that  _ long ago, the taste of icy bubblegum is indeed very refreshing.)

They sit in silence, mostly because Vanitas is crunching on ice like there’s no tomorrow and Kairi can’t think of anything to say.  _ Thanks for not killing me? What the hell happened to you? Why do you look like...like Sora? Are you...sad that your master was defeated? You don’t seem that sad about anything. _

All of those seemed like they would end in some combination of mall security and keyblade-related-bodily-harm, and she doesn’t need one more thing slowing down her search. 

Something glints dark blue in the corner of her eye. 

Twisting, her eyes land on a gently glimmering crown charm. 

Kairi dives for it, barely thinking to set aside her slushy and ignoring the squawking noise that Vanitas makes when she dives under the bench they’re sitting on.

_ [3/10 Shadow Fragments Released] _

As usual, the charm evaporates when she tries to grab it, and it’s completely trailed away by the time that Vanitas has inserted himself under the bench with her. “The hell are you doing kid?! You gone insane or something?”

Kairi slowly begins to realise how ridiculous it must look to have the two of them laying flat on the ground, heads under the mall bench. She tries to muffle a snort, and mostly fails, which leads to another, which just erupts into loud laughter. Her eyes water and her chest aches as she shakes with merriment, and if this isn’t a roundabout way to get store security into the mix, she doesn’t know what is. 

_ She hasn’t laughed quite like that for what feels like ages now. _

Vanitas is still looking at her like she’s gone round the bend, but at least it’s not directly antagonistic. If anything, his lips are quirking up into the most non-sadistic smile she’s seen from him yet, but his expression shutters quickly. He crawls out from under the bench, and Kairi can practically feel his disparaging stare in the back of her head. “You’re attracting attention. Get up.”

Still shaking slightly from laughter, Kairi gets up on her elbows and slowly crawls out. Sure enough, some concerned parents are looking in their direction, and before she can think too hard about any of it, Kairi grabs both her slushy and Vanitas’s hand, and takes off at a run. 

He makes an aggrieved noise but still keeps up with her, which beggars belief, but Kairi figures on this level it’s best just to accept it. If she’s managed to get this far with some violence and also a slushy...perhaps it’s best to hear him out, or at least...not leave him alone immediately. 

(It doesn’t escape her how ill fitting and worn his clothing is.)

After wandering around the store, mostly in silence, and finishing their slushies, the two of them somehow end up on the store roof. Vanitas is dangling his legs over the edge of the building, sprawled out on his back and watching the clouds. 

Kairi watches him from the corner of her eye. The line of tension in his posture has never really left, and she can make a good guess that he’d still be ready and willing to beat her into the ground should the mood of the moment change. 

Still. As it is, it’s....not ‘nice’ per se, but pleasantly surprising not to be currently skewered on a keyblade. However...the silence will have to break eventually.

“Why are you doing this?” 

Ah, there it is. Kairi shrugs, keeping her eyes on the street below. “Doing what?”

Vanitas sits up with a huff, and she’s hyper aware of the fact that she’s well within strangulation distance. “Doing...that.” Is that...a pout?

She turns slightly to look at him. “Doing...not calling for someone to come contain you?”

With some disconnectedness, she notices his knuckles are white. “...you’re stupid. I’m the enemy. Don’t you guardians want to destroy all the darkness? Or was that just so you can look all high and mighty?” He cocks an eyebrow at her, and no matter what tension is lying in wait in his posture, his face still carries a certain confidence.

Kairi tilts her head up towards the early afternoon sun. “Well...are you currently trying to destroy the universe?”

Vanitas looks at her like she’s gone insane. “What?”

With a shrug, Kairi tilts her head to the side. “If you’re not trying to carry out Xehanort’s plans any longer, I don’t see any reason to turn you over to anyone.”

That’s not...strictly true. If Vanitas is free to wander at large, he’s probably going to cause a disturbance at some point, if his nature truly is as it’s been described to her. 

But again, that’s not Kairi’s current problem.

(It itches, under her skin. The wasted time. The superficial futility of this situation. It’s not like anything she says will convince him to do anything he doesn’t want to do, that much is clear. She should be looking for Riku. She shouldn’t be here.)

He’s still looking at her, with condescension mixed with disbelief. “...imbecile. I am pure darkness. I will inevitably clash with the light, with the light of my brother! From birth, my whole being is made of darkened emotions. My destiny is-”

Kairi easily cuts him off. “Look. I don’t know what’s going on with you and Ventus. I don’t even know why you look like S-” she stutters, “...so like that. All I know is if you  _ ever _ -” and then Vanitas is fixed with a glare like blue fire, “-try to hurt my friends again, you’ll pay.” Her gaze slides back to the road below them. “Other than, I don’t have anything against you.”

Vanitas’s eyes are very wide for a moment, but he snaps back into whatever composure he’s attempting to embody quickly enough. “...you’d...you’re saying you’ve forgotten about all the things I’ve done already.” He turns away with a scoff. “Stupid princess. I’m pure darkness. I can be nothing else.”

She doesn’t bother looking up. “And I’m pure light. And yet...we’re not so very different, are we? Still caught up in everyone else’s designs, no matter what we are or what we want for ourselves.”

_ Riku. I almost hope you haven’t just run away.  _

He’s silent for a very long moment after that. Kairi just looks back up at the clouds.

With every piece of her, Kairi loves Sora. She loves Riku too, but maybe she’s loved Sora for a little longer. Sora’s smile, his determination, his considerate nature that was clearly evident even as a small child. His trust, so stalwart and yet so easily given.    


_ Blue eyes, looking at her with such aching fondness. _

Maybe that’s why it’s an acute feeling, neither necessarily painful nor remotely happy, to see that same face with a blood red stare and a seemingly permanent scowl. It softens her in familiarity and raises her hackles at the same moment. 

To get to the bottom line, maybe she just hopes Vanitas can find his own happiness, even if it’s a selfish wish in its essence. She’s past caring about little technicalities like that. 

“...is being pure light as painful?” 

Kairi starts slightly at the unexpected question. When she glances over, he’s looking away, and his tone is as carefully guarded as she’s heard it.

Considering for a moment, she responds. “I don’t know if it’s painful in the same way. It…” Kairi furrows her brow and carries on, despite the fact she’s never really articulated this to anyone before. “...lately I’ve started to wonder if I’m really complete like this. I don’t know how else to be...but everyone talks about it like I’m different. Special.” She rests her chin on her knees. “I guess I don’t really think about it like that. I’m still myself, no matter what anyone says my heart is made of.” 

Beside her, Vanitas stands slowly, and has turned around so Kairi can no longer see what kind of expression he’s making. “...pretty words. You denizens of light sure like those.” 

She raises an eyebrow, despite the fact he’s not looking. “You asked me if it was painful. I answered as best I could.” 

The sounds of a corridor swallowing him up is the only thing that responds. 

After a moment, Kairi stands with a grunt, now alone on the rooftop. Midday is almost over. 

It’s time she was on her way. Riku is waiting. 

(But all in all...she’d say that went strangely well. No one died at least, that’s for certain.)

She raises Destiny’s Embrace and thinks about her wayward friend. 

_ Riku.  _

_ I will do this. _

She’s swallowed by the gentle and warm light. 

When the light finally fades, Kairi is left standing on a pier. Stretching up before her is a city, on an island from the looks of it, and the quaint town is colored in fluttering flags and brightly painted stalls.

She blinks, taking in the sight. Is this where Riku has crept off to? It certainly looks...festive. 

Her Gummi phone chirps in her pocket.

_ [12:36] nams _ _ ♡:  _ Kairi?

_ [12:36] Me:  _ yes!! kairi here!

_ [12:36] Me:  _ idk where i am yet...no sign of riku tho. it’s a city? good vibes here

_ [12:37]  _ _ nams _ _ ♡:  _ A city? What sort of city?

_ [12:36] Me:  _ a city surrounded by water. i’ll text u when i learn more!!

The phone goes back into her skirt pocket, and Kairi squares her shoulders.

No way for it but forward. She sets off further into the town, feeling oddly cheered by the jubilant atmosphere of the place.

Down the main street, she’s hailed by several vendors but keeps mainly to herself. The people here are dressed simply, but there is an air of celebration that permeates throughout the streets, putting a smile on the face of every passerby. Kairi finds herself with a little bit more of a spring in her step than she had in the last world. 

Even if Riku isn’t here and her chase must continue further yet...she wants to come back here with him. With both of them. 

A stall of steamed buns calls to her, or rather, calls to her nose. She leans in to get a good whiff before hurrying on. She just had a slushy, and besides, Kairi doubts that this world uses the same currency as anything she might have left on her person.

Wandering past the square, well, it’s more of a round really, she comes to a halt before a mosaic. It’s of a couple, dressed finely, and carrying a small child with green eyes. Flowers are set before the picture, left as if in tribute. 

She kneels down to look at them, as several are unfamiliar to her. She’s never seen roses colored in purple before...or those swirly orange blossoms...

...hmm?

_ A crown! _

She swipes at it, to the unsurprising result of the ensuing letdown when her fist closes around nothing.

_ [4/10 Shadow Fragments Released] _

What are those things anyway?

It doesn’t seem to be too much to assume that if attempting to open a portal to Riku isn’t actually doing that...maybe it’s taking her to these...charms. Maybe...it’s like a breadcrumb trail?

Satisfied with this metaphor, Kairi stands, brushes off her knees, and turns to leave. She hasn’t found anything significant yet, or at least, nothing significant that she’s actually looking for. She should search in other areas of this place.

Well, she turns around alright, but then immediately crashes into a young woman, and their entangled ankles send them both crashing down to the pavement.

Kairi makes a pained noise when her tailbone meets the stone, and hurriedly sit ups to see if the other girl is alright. 

“I’m sorry!”

“My apologies!”

They speak at the same time, and it devolves into lightly awkward laughter as Kairi meets the gaze of a sprightly young lady with choppy brown hair. “No really, it’s my fault. I should’ve looked where I was going.” 

The lady hops upright and extends a delicate hand to Kairi. “Think nothing of it! I was going too fast, so I’m also to blame.”

Kairi gently accepts the hand up and surreptitiously adjusts her skirt. “Let’s say we’re both at fault!” She gives a small grin. 

Giggling, the young lady inclines her head. “What’s your name? I don’t believe we’ve been introduced.”

“My name is Kairi.” She lets herself drop into a small curtsy. “I’m not really from around here.”

_ She’s pretty... _

The other girl curtsies back effortlessly. “It’s nice to meet you Kairi! I’m Rapunzel. Are you passing through?” Her head tilts to the side and it’s then that Kairi is struck by how green her eyes are.

_ There’s something else about her...I just can’t put my finger on it.  _

She nods eagerly. “Yes! I’ve got to be getting home soon. But this is a lovely town!”

It’s really something she’s saying just for the sake of getting this conversation over with, but it rings true. Her father will worry if she’s gone with no word again. Hopefully Naminé will cover for her...even if that means she owes a favor now. 

Rapunzel smiles widely. “I see. Come back and visit when you get the chance! We love having visitors here.” The festive atmosphere of the town would certainly seem to indicate so, and Kairi can already see herself planning a trip itinerary in the future. 

She dips her chin in acknowledgement. “I certainly will! I have to ask, is there a party going on? Everything is decorated so nicely.” 

To her surprise, Rapunzel flushes a pale pink. Kairi’s heart thumps in her chest. “It’s beautiful isn’t it? We’re celebrating the engagement of the princess! She’ll be getting married in the coming Spring.” 

Kairi nods along politely, and wonders how quickly she can duck into an alleyway and portal out of here. “How lovely! Spring weddings are always...nice.” 

She doesn’t quite know why she hasn’t bowed out of this conversation yet, when her mind is elsewhere and she’s itching to move onward. Talking to this girl...it’s...familiar? No, that’s not quite the right word. 

_ There’s an odd sense of...solidarity. I can’t explain it all.  _

Either way, she’s weirdly eager to come back here one day, and hopefully run into Rapunzel again. 

The said Rapunzel practically glitters in the sun. “So I’ve heard!! I’m hoping it’ll be absolutely perfect.” A beat of silence. “For the princess.” 

Kairi distantly notes that something’s not quite being said here, but doesn’t feel the need to worry about it yet. “I’m sure she’ll have a lovely time in a city like this.” She shifts her weight, and resignedly bites the bullet. “I’ll say hi if I see you again!” Without even bothering to wait for Rapunzel’s response, Kairi ducks away, and  _ sprints _ . 

_ ...I can apologize for running away next time!! _

Back through the market, through winding streets and around startled vendors, Kairi finds herself back down at the pier, wandering back out to the very end of the wooden dock. 

She sighs. 

So this city has a princess...it’s possible that the princess of this world is also a Princess of Heart. 

Kairi sighs again, harder, and slumps down on the edge of the pier. 

Princesses of Heart...hearts of pure light...hearts of pure darkness...a darkness that is not inherently evil. 

_ In that case, is there a light that is not inherently good? _

Her head’s spinning a little. Creating so many portals in such a small span of time is beginning to take its toll. Having Yen Sid or Merlin explain it on a blackboard is one thing, but actually having to do it over and over is another. 

Back in...back in Radiant Garden, Ansem the Wise had certainly had enough to say about Princesses of Heart. About his own experiments into the heart, about the implications of what a heart of pure light would mean, practically speaking. He spoke about it as if it were simply an as-of-yet unexplored branch of science, as if the only reason they knew so little were the existence of so few test subjects, and the rigours of world order. 

There lay the obvious answer, of a Princess of Heart not constrained by world order. Of a heart of pure light simply waiting around, in full knowledge of her situation. 

Kairi couldn’t get out of that castle fast enough. 

_ She couldn’t help but think about certain nights. Nights when she can’t sleep, and neither can Naminé, and Riku isn’t there to provide warm arms to disappear into (and vague feelings of guilt that she has this specific escape when Naminé does not). Nights when she and her Other end up curled up in the same blanket, and talk about everything and nothing at all.  _

Naminé has nightmares of being alone in a lab. Naminé has nightmares about being very much not alone in a lab. At one point, when the two were made initially made one again, Kairi’s had some of those same nightmares. 

_ There is no love lost between the Nobodies and Ansem the Wise.  _

His words filter back to her now. Droning on and on about “maidens of pure destiny” and “those blessed with the True Light”. There was something about “Light preserving it’s integrity and malleability at once, an uncontainable force”. “Light wants to be whole; it does not suffer fractures when it is radiant at it’s core”. “Light attracts light in as much as it attracts darkness”. “A great heart, which binds all light within itself”. “A heart of no darkness, no pain; it is surely enviable”. 

_ Enviable. _

The light that solidifies into Destiny’s Embrace has a soft and gentle warmth to it. Kairi lifts it up, and breathes slowly. 

_ Onwards. Riku's waiting. _

When her feet touch down on the other side of the gate, they are not the feet she initially leaped in with. 

“...eh?”

Kairi looks down at herself in disbelief, and stares at fuzzy rose colored paws. 

(Her necklace glows faintly.)

* * *

_ I was...running? _

_ What was I looking for? _

_ Soft hands...a kind smile… _

_ She’s so pretty when she blushes.  _

_ ...huh? _

_ Who...I see a face...but I don’t quite recognise it.  _

_ Is that me? Or...someone else? _

_ Something about those blue eyes makes me sad. _


	5. Dawning Interim

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I wonder if you could drown in tears. Please don’t fall off buildings, for your own sake. (Chapter includes small nod towards Frozen 2, but no spoilers are included, and no knowledge of Frozen 2 is necessary.)

Concrete again.

What’s worse than the concrete however, are the  _ wings.  _

Riku flinches away when his hands meet hard webbing, rooted in the two new appendages that have graced his shoulder blades. Their texture is rough, not smooth and velvety like those of a Komory Bat, and of what he can see from craning his neck around, they’re the same dark bruise color that’s already seeped through so much of the rest of his body. They’re not too much shorter than his arm span, and Riku really doesn’t know how to feel about that. 

(It’s somewhat annoying that they’ve gone and ripped directly through the fabric of his t-shirt, but at least it’s still mostly wearable. In this situation, at least.)

This new, perhaps most unsettling addition, for some reason feels the most unreal, and perhaps that’s why it only leaves a vague roiling sensation in the pit of his stomach, rather than a more visceral discomfort. He doesn’t try to articulate the wings more than is absolutely necessary, or that he can help at all, and he absolutely does not try to fly with them. 

(He definitely thinks about it though. Even with everything else about this situation, he definitely thinks about it.)

The city he has awoken in is not the city he recalls from before, but it definitely has some strong similarities. The sky is dark, clear but barren of stars (though perhaps it’s simply the light pollution). The streets are just as empty as he expected, but this time, no shadows appear no matter where he looks. 

Riku wanders, not thinking about much of anything.

As before, time does not visibly pass, but the longer that he wanders without seeing Kairi, the more something rumbles in his chest. It normally doesn’t take this long to find her...and in the immediate absence of his goal, his mind falters.

_ “You are almost gone. Soon, you will be nothing more than a flimsy shade, waiting to be expunged. That’s all you ever really were.” _

The violence with which Mickey’s voice, twisted with anger, cuts through the silence is genuinely startling, and it takes Riku a moment longer than usual to pull himself together.

“We’ll see about that.” He bites back to the empty air, and his voice sounds raspy to his own ears.

_ As if he’s never come up with that one on his own. _

To distract himself, Riku starts thinking about the first things he’ll do when he returns. First, he’s going to hug Kairi and apologize, and hopefully he can get the hug before she inevitably decks him in the jaw. Secondly, or at least, at some point, he’ll apologize to Mickey for ignoring his voice, more because he still feels guilty about it than any other reason.

Thirdly...thirdly, he’s going to start thinking even harder about where to find Sora. Does he know where to begin? Even now, no, absolutely not. Will that stop him?

_ Not for any longer. _

His feet, which are surprisingly not scraped up from walking around so long barefoot, ache with a vengeance. It’s the same weight that has seeped through the rest of his muscles, something dragging him downwards and begging him not to go on.

Simply to spite it, he speeds up. It’s as if he can feel his bones creak the more that he shoves through the pain, and Riku simply ignores the way his body whispers at him to slow down, take a rest, fall asleep, fade away… It’d be so simply just to stop here. Just for a moment, just for a few minutes…

He breaks into a run. 

_ Running through the sand, Sora hot on his heels. Chasing Kairi, trying to splash her as big as he can. Sprinting, raising Soul Eater above his head to bring it down on top of a heartless. Dashing, as fast as he can, Braveheart poised to strike.  _

_ Endlessly, running in shadow. _

Riku shakes his head to clear it, not breaking his pace. There is an end to this. He has to believe that. 

He has to.

Suddenly, there! There, he spots it, an unnatural glow on the top of a building not too far away. There’s a slight urge to bump his fist in the air, but Riku saves his energy for running. 

...there is the obvious issue of how to scale the building. 

All doors on the perimeter are locked, but Riku grits his teeth, somewhat shakily expands his wings, and uses them to help propel him up the side. It’s a grim dash, but somehow the wings, as well as the claws which sink into the metal sides of the building with ease, carry him swiftly to the top. 

At some point, the clumsy braid comes undone, and whips around to hit him in the face. He crests up and over the edge of the roof, and shoves the hair out of his eyes. 

She should be radiant against the backdrop of night, but as much as Riku squints, he can’t even make out any of Kairi’s features anymore. It’s just a distorted glow that awaits him, shining with a burning, painful intensity. 

Riku approaches with more hesitance than before, but the light swallows him up just the same.

_ [9/10 Pure Lights Obtained] _

It’s as if he’s directly stepped into the Keyblade Graveyard.

Riku hears himself inhale sharply, as he stands nerveless, just where he stood when he watched Sora walk away from him. 

Memories come flooding back with a dry vengeance, the odd sensation of sand in his nose, the exhausted but triumphant air that their group had carried with them, the ache in his muscles that carried with it the weight of the universe itself…

The absolute trust and dispassion he had had to force upon himself in that instant, to let Sora go just like that.

The air hangs heavy around him, and Riku gulps, stepping forward on instinct. The dust of the ground feels like nothing. 

_ First step. _

He knows what to do now.

_ Second step. _

It might cost him his life.

_ Third step. Fourth step. _

That’s fine.

_ Fifth step. Sixth stepSeventh stepEighthstepNinthsteptenthstepeleventhstep- _

Two more steps and he skitters to a stop, calling Braveheart to hand and leaping. 

_ Sora. _

_ Sora. His best friend for as far back as he can remember.  _

_ Sora. The light that pulls him out of the darkness. The light that has pulled the universe out of darkness, time and time again. _

_ Sora.  _

_ Sora, who means everything to me. _

_ Sora, who I love with every piece of the person I am. _

_ Sora. _

The portal forms, and Riku dives in an absolute panic, darting through at what feels like the last possible second.

_ I’m sorry Kairi, for taking so long. I’ll bring him home for you. For us. _

_ I promise.  _

Through light, the new world around him begins to filter into place. It’s hazy, and it’s a slow glide that sets him down and onto his feet. 

When Riku looks up, the strange white architecture of the place that Sora had fought Xehanort stretches up before him. He sees none of it, does not take in any of the crumbling ivory ruins left behind by their battle.

There, there, directly before him, a shadowy figure smiles brightly.

“S-”

And with one wisp, the figure is gone, leaving only nothingness and the thudding of Riku’s heart in his chest. 

Noise.

Noise is what filters in next. 

The air brushing against the broken buildings, the creaking of metal pinwheels, the sound of water moving against the wind.

Riku gasps for breath and staggers, ducking his head and curling in on himself. 

Everything is suddenly in color. The blue of the water at night is the right shade of darkness. Stars twinkle very faintly above. The color of the pavement below him is a dusky warm color, and it’s almost painful to look at it, after so long within muted shades and greys. White ruins pile up in every direction.

(He doesn’t know if it makes him feel better or worse, to see the carnage left behind by what he can reasonably assume was a brutal fight.)

There remains a faint thrumming of  _ wrongness  _ to the calm and broken splendour of it all, especially as the cool sweet air brushes against the webbed appendages sprouting from his back. 

He hears himself make a noise that is neither sigh, nor groan, nor whimper. His body  _ aches _ , as if the gentle touch of wind is abrasive. With pain, he forces his head up again. His ears are ringing faintly against the new noise of the wind.

_ “Riku.” _

He knows that voice. Knows it better than any other. 

“Sora!” Riku stumbles forward, craning to look around for the source of the voice. “Sora!!” His shouts sound ten times louder even against the noise of the wind.

There’s...nothing…

No... _ no… _

...wait. There.

At the end of the walkway, closer to where the path leads into the town, he sees the flickering shadow, moving softly as if buffeted by the breeze. It smiles over its shoulder at him with a quiet contentment. 

He dashes forward, and it’s already gone by the time he skids to a stop. Riku’s breath is lodged firmly in his throat and he swallows around it, and carries on. 

His feet pound against the stone, through the town, up a set of crumbling staircases, around broken patio tables, past an unattended bazaar stall left cleaved right through, through the ruins of gardens, up, up, and further up, until he’s reached whatever establishment is placed at the apex of the town. 

(The wind moving on his face again as he runs is something both familiar, and unsettling in that he never missed it until it wasn’t there anymore.)

The wings unfurl themselves, and it sends spikes of pain through nerves he’s never registered feeling before. 

In the next moment, Riku leaps, and scales the building with an unnatural grace, with wings pushing back against the air and sending him hurtling forward, and claws that anchor themselves in the building’s stone. He pushes off without any care to further damage in the architecture that he leaves behind. It is an odd technique of motion that he’s never learned before, but it feels as simple as breathing, as though even in the midst of heavy mutation he is still somehow himself. 

Riku hurls himself over the edge, and rolls the last few feet to safety. 

...well. He’d never anticipated coming  _ here _ again. 

Slowly raising himself to his feet, Riku surveys the rooftop pavilion where they had found Sora and the aged master after it was all mostly over. It’s empty, and the dark blue pieces of night shine peacefully down on it.

Kingdom Hearts looks down upon him with a baleful light. 

It almost causes him to take a reflexive step back at the sight of the white heart-moon up above him, now unobscured by the buildings. He can’t tear his eyes away from the light; it pierces him to the bone and alters the ache within him until he can no longer remember the source of the pain.

Riku feels the skin on his bare arms and legs tingle, as if the light is reacting to it in a tangible sense. The urge to itch at it is there, but the wind moves against his overgrown nails and he forcibly refrains. 

_ What now? _

His feet carry him forward, to the spot where they’d found Sora, near the center of the rooftop. The wind is harsher higher up, and his hair is buffeted around and into his face, like an especially unwieldy curtain of pale silver.

(There are tears beginning to prick lightly behind his eyes.)

Riku rubs at his eyes with his knuckles, and blinks to clear his vision. Shouldn’t there be a glowing Kairi somewhere around here? He hasn’t seen one yet...and it’s been harder to focus, now the wind makes noises and everything feels somehow real again.

_ Sora...where are you? What do I have to do? And Kairi...how do I find my way back to you? _

Something shudders in his periphery. 

Slowly, Riku raises his head, and makes direct eye contact with something that looks just like Sora, standing just at the edge of the rooftop. 

Sora smiles. 

He doesn’t even register moving before he’s reaching, running, sprinting, a wordless shout rending itself from his throat. He stumbles, slips, and when his hand grazes at the shadowy shoulder of the shade with Sora’s face, it goes straight through. 

Riku hears himself make a wounded noise, but it’s lost to the wind in the next instant, as his footing slips, and then, and then-

Falling, off the side of the building, passing directly through the shadow with the beguiling eyes. He’s buffeted harshly by the sudden wind, and miraculously doesn’t fall and impale himself on the rubble. 

Before Riku can even think hard enough to try to struggle with moving his wings against the air, he’s plunged directly down into the water, ice cold and consuming, 

_ So...this is how it ends? _

He barely fights against the pressure, disoriented and numb. It hardly feels worthwhile, to fight back up and chase around the ephemeral shadows any longer.

No matter how fast he tries to run...always just out of reach.

The pale light filtering through the water’s surface becomes more distant with every passing second. Riku squints up at it for only a moment, before letting his eyelids slip shut. 

_ Maybe...maybe I needn’t have bothered at all...if my fate really is unavoidable. Sinking into shadows...I could’ve told you already that this is how it would go.  _

_ Destiny...if there is one sky, is there one ocean? I wonder if the earth really did used to be all connected together.  _

_ ...it doesn’t matter anymore. At least not to me. _

Memories flash upon the inside of his eyelids. Mickey, silent, but smiling encouragingly up at him.  Naminé, her small voice calm, explaining her pictures to him when he asked. His replica, looking fondly at him with unsettlingly familiar aquamarine.  A̶x̶e̶l̶Lea, always with a wry joke and a vaguely supportive pat on the shoulder. Master Aqua, a voice of reason and a guiding touch. Childhood friends, misty faces from Destiny Islands, kind strangers he had met on the many worlds he’d visited…

It all flies past in a blur of colors and echoey voices. Underneath it all, two sets of near-identical blue watch him, silent, waiting, patient. 

_ Kairi… _

_ I’m sorry. I’m sorry I can’t be the person you think I am. I’m the darkness to Sora’s light, a shadow that he casts, something that fades when the night arrives. You shine brighter than either of us, so I hope you understand.  _

The light from above him has completely disappeared, and now the darkness stretches out in every direction. Riku continues to sink into the watery shadows, eyes half lidded, and lips slightly parted. 

_ If...if there is any sort of afterlife...I hope I find him there.  _

It’s a strange sensation, the barely there cognizance of tears leaving his eyes and immediately disappearing into the deep water.

_ I couldn’t save you. Either of you. I couldn’t even save myself… _

_ All I can hope for is that I get the chance to ask for your forgiveness. Somewhere beyond death...beyond oblivion...I have to believe that our spirits will cross paths, even in another life. _

_ But...somehow...somehow I’m at peace with this. I anticipated it...even if I tried not to believe it.  _

_ Hey...Sora? _

_ I̶ ̶m̶i̶s̶s̶ ̶y̶o̶u̶ ̶s̶o̶ ̶m̶u̶c̶h̶.̶ _

_ Wait for me, wherever you are, okay? _

* * *

  
  


_ ...I still can’t quite remember.  _

_ But I was definitely looking for someone! _

_ I can’t remember their name either.  _

_ Or was it more than one someone…? _

_ ....I’m sleepy.  _

_ She has...red hair.  _

_ I don’t know how I know that...but I do.  _

_ His eyes are so bright when he looks at...me. _

_ ...it’s a prettier blue than the ocean. Greener than the sky.  _

_ I...love them. _

_ Whoever you both are, I’m sorry I can’t remember your names!! _

_ ...hope they’d forgive me. _

_ I...I...I need to...to... _

_ Am I...crying?  _

_ I want to wake up! _

_ ...who was I? _

_ …….when I remember that, I’ll wake up.  _

_ Until then...I guess I’ll just rest here a little longer.  _

* * *

  
  
  


What...what on earth is this world??

Kairi stares numbly into the reflection in the glass. A reflection, which showcases a bipedal canine being, with big floppy red ears, and fluffy pink fur. It’s wearing the top part of her hoodie dress, just the hood and the short sleeves. It has three bright blue eyes, an extra one seated in the center of the forehead.

Numbly, she waves at the oddly intimidating creature. The reflection waves back.

Is that...a tail??

Kairi wags her fluffy rose-colored tail in a fit of disbelief. 

What...what on...nevermind. She has a task before her. 

_ One foot...one paw before the other.  _

_ ...never thought I’d find Riku looking like  _ this.

Kairi begins scanning the area for the other denizens of this world. What is it about this place that makes visitors look so....like this?

(Her necklace pulses a bright white. Kairi doesn’t notice.)

Suddenly, voices sound out from behind her. 

Whirling around, Kairi does what anyone would do when suddenly transformed into an inhuman creature in a strange world, and hides behind the nearest opaque object. In this case, it happens to be behind a crate stacked with oblong yellow canisters.

Footsteps sound out closer and closer. Kairi peeks out from her hiding place curiously, and holds her breath. 

Down the way, which appears to be outdoors in some kind of...facility (?) two figures approach, one significantly taller than the other. It’s...well, Kairi has never particularly envisioned what a giant wolf would look like if it walked around on two legs and had been rolled around in bright blue paint, but that’s the first thing that comes to mind to look at at the taller figure. The small one is jet black and sparkling slightly, complete with one incredibly large blue eye that takes up their entire face. 

They trail off into silence as they approach, and Kairi does her best to hold her breath. Something tells her discovery would be bad...even if she’s slightly too frazzled to get at the exact ‘why’ of that issue. 

The wolf-creature walks with enough gravitas that they seem to send vibrations through the floor every time they set their giant paw down. The little one, which Kairi doesn’t know how to describe except as ‘vaguely reptilian’, makes no noise, or maybe whatever sound their webbed feet make are simply silent in the face of their companion’s heavy footfalls. 

Kairi scooches further back against the side of the building, between the storage canisters and a concrete wall. She holds one pink paw up to her mouth (...snout…), and tries not to focus on how weird it feels and instead focus on complete silence. 

_ I don’t want to be found...but for some reason I’m...not scared.  _

_ It feels...I feel oddly exhausted.  _

The two monsters slow to a stop, and of  _ course _ they have to stand directly in front of her hiding place. 

Kairi curses inwardly. 

They’re silent, until the taller one makes a deep growling noise in the back of their throat, as if in question, tilting their fearsome head to the side. 

The little one blinks their oversized eye, and simply nods, as if some silent communication has easily been had. The reptilian figure then hurries on ahead, sparkling and glinting under the cover of the clear dark night that currently hangs over this world. 

The wolf hesiatates a moment longer. Kairi focuses on not inhaling sharply. 

_ Their face...it’s all scarred up.  _

Clearly visible through the blue fur, a cross-shaped scar sits between the wolf’s eyes, extending down onto their snout. 

Before she can dwell too long on that, or the unexpected instance of deja vu echoing in the back of her mind, her eyes catches on a dark blue glint on the other side of the walkway. 

_ It’s one of those charms!! _

She grits her teeth. Once the wolf leaves....she can grab the charm and be out of here. 

The creature continues to stand very still, and then, in a movement that makes the fur on the back of Kairi’s neck stand up, their gaze slides towards her hiding place. 

The next perfectly still and silent moment that ensues has her holding her breath for dear life. 

_ ….hurry up and leave already!! _

Her chest is starting to hurt slightly from holding her breath in. It’s harder...with the reconfiguration of her nose. 

Then, thankfully, in a moment that is pure bliss, the monster turns away, and begins striding away and after their companion. 

Once they’re safely around the corner, Kairi allows herself to exhale harshly. 

_ Why would...nevermind. Let’s get the charm and blow this place.  _

She scampers over to it, and the crown charm wisps away into sandy little streams with one bat of her paw. 

_ [5/10 Shadow Fragments Released] _

Destiny’s Embrace is in her grip and shooting out a beam of light down the walkway barely before another moment can pass. Kairi sprints towards the light in a mad dash. 

_ Please...let the next world be more normal.  _

_ Riku? _

Thankfully, thankfully, when she alights on the other side, she’s in her normal body. Kairi takes a moment to gasp with relief and adjusts her waistband out of habit. 

Who knew she’d ever be so grateful to see her own skin? 

....hmm?

Kairi raises on hand to her face and squints at it. Something about it is...different. 

She’s...glowing faintly. It’s ever so slight, but there’s a pale luminescence to her body that certainly wasn’t there before. 

_ Wha...what the…? _

Even her fingernails are lit up as if from beneath, and twisting around, Kairi notes with growing apprehension that some individual strands of dark red hair are also gleaming slightly more than could be considered natural. 

She swallows hard. Maybe...maybe it’s from going through too many portals today…?

Whatever. She can ask Merlin once this is all over and dealt with. With that decided, Kairi starts marching forward. 

Hmm...she’s on the outskirts of a woods, next to what appears to be a large body of water that lets out into the sea. Sort of like a grossly oversized inlet. Further inland, there appears to be a castle town on the edge of the water, framed by stone walls. 

She sets off towards it, with a lack of other distinct landmarks. Will Riku finally be here? 

Honestly...she’s beginning to really doubt it. 

The walk towards the town is punctuated only by her sharp footfalls. 

_ Riku....I can’t decide if I want to hug you first or sock you in the jaw. _

The town stretches up above her, gentle and yet austere. The stone is a quiet grey color, and the flag that flies above is suitably cool-toned to match. There is a sense of peace here...of something at rest. 

Kairi marches up the paved way with the same vim and vigor that’s sponsored her journey thus far, but the spark in her step is beginning to lag. To be quite honest, she’s running on fumes at this point. 

The town is bustling, and it would seem to be late afternoon. People are moving in droves, and Kairi catches onto the fact that they seem to be congregating in the town square. She finds a place in the back of the commotion and tries to peer over the heads of those taller than her. 

On a small pavillion slightly raised from the cobblestone of the town streets, a regal young woman is standing. Her hair is woven into a long braid, and she’s dressed in a fine gown of pale violet. What looks to be like official guards are flanking her on either side, faces set like stone. 

The young lady raises her pale hands and addresses the crowd in a soft yet commanding voice. 

“Fair Arendelle, thank you for allowing me your ears. We are gathered here to celebrate the eve of the anniversary of our founding, five score years ago.”

The crowd breaks into a cheer at that, and the lady smiles indulgently at the townsfolk, interrupted as she was. Kairi hoists herself up on a small stone wall to see better. 

_ That woman...it’s the same feeling, as with the girl with the green eyes.  _

The lady gestures towards the sky. “We honor the brave founders of this kingdom with a feast on the morrow, and I applaud every one of you for your contribution to the preparations. It is a glad sight, to see our people flourishing in this Harvestime.”

The crowd cheers again, and it seems the jubilant air is strong enough that it really doesn’t seem to matter what the lady is saying, for the crowd would be cheering anyway at this rate. A girl with ginger hair in the very front row whoops loud enough to be heard by the whole square. 

Kairi absentmindedly claps along with a handful of other people standing near her, smiling despite herself. It seems that this town too is in the process of celebration. She’s not a part of it, but it’s hard not to be infected by the spirit of it all. 

The pale lady is still speaking, but Kairi hops down from her perch and begins to shoulder her way out of the town square. If there’s a charm in this world, she should find it and get going. 

It takes some time to work her way out of the crowd, but eventually she finds herself wandering around at the docks, at the very outside of the city. The water is still, and sparkling, and she can’t help herself from plopping down at the edge of the wooden pier and letting her legs dangle. 

Her head is hanging low. 

“...where are you?” Kairi sighs through her teeth. “This is exhausting.”

Framed against the darkness of the water, it’s even clearer that something is just plain off about her skin. Her legs look almost translucent, as though there’s no blood under her skin. 

** _Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrring. _ **

With a start, Kairi fumbles for her Gummiphone. Wrestling it out of her pocket, she taps the screen in a flurry and-

_ “Kairi?” _

Naminé is looking concernedly at her through the screen. 

Kairi hurriedly slaps a wide grin on. “Naminé! How are you?” She hopes how frazzled her voice is isn’t coming across on the call. 

Her Other gives her a small smile that isn’t really a smile at all, and ignores the question.  _ “You hadn’t checked in for a bit.” _

She winces. Yeah...she kind of did drop the ball on that, didn’t she. “...I’m sorry.” She self-consciously tucks a lock of hair behind her ear. “I got a little caught up in...everything.”

Naminé inclines her head very slightly.  _ “Are you alright? You sound tired.”  _

Grimacing within the grin, Kairi shrugs lightly. “I’m fine. I’m just....it’s fine.”

_ “...I see.”  _ Naminé doesn’t seem to buy that one bit but doesn’t press her. The small image of her face on the screen is especially washed out against her pale hair.  _ “So no luck yet?” _

“No.” Kairi’s gaze slides down to the cool dark water. “Nothing yet.” 

_ “I notified the other Guardians. They’ll call if they see him.”  _

Kairi starts slightly. “Oh, you did?” That’s right...Naminé had said something like that earlier. “...thanks.” 

She’s not alone in this. 

Somewhat enthused, she raises her gaze to look back at Naminé. “I’ll just go a bit longer before calling it a day, alright?”

Naminé’s brows furrow.  _ “Kairi, I think you should come home now. You can start again tomorrow.” _

It’s as though she can feel her eye twitch in vague annoyance. “Naminé, I can do this. Just a bit longer...please?” And with a certain amount of shame, she turns her blue eyes on Naminé like a puppy. 

_ I know I’m getting closer. I have to be. _

Her Other caves quickly. Indeed, it’s something they’ll probably have to address at some point, how much trouble Naminé has ever saying no to her.  _ “Just...don’t be long.”  _ She punctuates it with a small sigh, that Kairi doubts she was meant to hear. 

She nods firmly into the phone’s camera. “Mm! I won’t.” 

The click with which she shuts the call down seems to echo a bit louder in her ears than it must in reality. 

Kairi climbs up from her seat on the pier, and turns towards the town in a huff. First, she needs to find the little charm...wherever it might be. 

As she picks her way among the row boats and small fishing boats that lay docked along the pier, thoughts swirl in her mind. 

_ How many of these have I even found by now? And what  _ are  _ they? They look just like Sora’s necklace...but the wrong color.  _

_ I...Sora…. _

It’s like walking headfirst into an oncoming wave. 

_ Sora’s smiling eyes...the way he awkwardly tries to hold my hand sometimes...I can’t stop myself from smiling at that bashful look on his face.  _

_ I know me and Riku look at him the same way sometimes. I don’t know if he notices though...for better or worse, sometimes these things go right over Sora’s head.  _

_ I wonder...what would happen if...if… _

_ The way I feel about Sora...and the way I feel about Riku...it’s almost the same, but not quite. Sora is Sora, and Riku is Riku. That’s all I want. To be with them.  _

_ Riku can be a big idiot sometimes, but I know now I can trust in the strength of his heart. He just wants to best for Sora…and to keep being his friend. I think he always has.  _

_ (I wonder if that extends to me. I think so...but maybe I’m just seeing what I want to. He’s certainly...I don’t know. He’s never really flat out said anything to that effect, has he.)  _

_ I know I want to be there for Sora, no matter what happens. He’s saved me so many times that this is just unfair. I can’t believe that this...that he...that he’s really… _

_ He’s not. I know it in my heart. When he gets back, I’m going to give him a hug, and then I’m going to tell him exactly what I think of his behavior.  _

_ The hug...the hug that I couldn’t bring myself to give him back when...back when… _

A sob rises up in the back of her throat. 

...it would seem she has more tears yet to cry over this. Of course...an ocean’s worth would not suffice. 

Through tears running glittering down her face, Kairi rubs at her nose harshly, and soldiers on. She blinks hard to clear her vision. 

The charm. She just needs the charm and then she can move on. 

In between the sparkly tears, something flashes once, and then again within the blur. A dark blue glint, teasing. 

Kairi muffles a sob as she kneels down and nudges the charm nestled up against one of the wood pillars supporting the boardwalk. It only takes a small brush of her finger to completely disintegrate it. 

_ [6/10 Shadow Fragments Released] _


	6. Gleaming Entrancement

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Light burns. Light consumes. Light rejects. Light, is in all of us.
> 
> [[Content Warning for eye horror/gore. Content Warning ends after the first section break.]]

_ …….this darkness feels...different. _

_ Somehow I thought death would be a lot...colder. _

_ Hm…? I...what? I can feel my heart beating...slowly, but it’s ringing in my ears. _

_ I’m not...I’m not gone? _

_ I’m still...how I was? These damn wings are definitely still here... _

_ I...I need to open my eyes. _

It is a deep struggle, the fight to remain easily suspended in the nothingness, when the awaiting promise of light and vision is so counterintuitive. It promises pain, and vengeance. The darkness soothes; a deep and melancholy balm. 

Something waits beyond. Something...something beckoning softly. A heartfelt call, four notes ringing out with a haunting cadence. 

Very slowly, with all the grandeur and circumstance of a long forgotten ritual, Riku remembers how to breathe. Air comes in faintly at first, and then all at once, and suddenly he’s gasping, a raw sensation echoing through his chest. 

He...he’s floating...suspended somewhere, weightless.

Riku’s eyes fly open, and with that, the air suddenly drops out from beneath him, and he hurtles to the ground with a jagged scream. 

The harsh landing that he’s expecting never quite comes, and instead, Riku finds himself bouncing lightly on...a mattress? 

On further inspection, a mattress was meer wishful thinking, and it appears the object upon which he has landed is, in fact, a cloud. 

It’s...surprisingly solid. Riku has fallen through clouds before, and those were much more...much less corporeal. The opposite of solid. Genuinely gaseous, incredibly enough.

This is more...pillow-like. As if someone blended a marshmallow and a mattress together in a stroke of fell genius. It’s a soft golden color, and gives way slightly under his weight. The landing is still enough to knock the air out of his lungs, but Riku blinks up in a stupor, amazed to be in one piece.

Groggily, he sits up, and sharply looks around. 

_ Where...wha.... _

What meets his eyes is an odd splendor the likes of which he has never seen before. Golden light stretches out in every direction. It filters through the clouds softly, radiating down in gentle patterns and dappled rays. 

It’s as if...as if this entire place is made of nothing but clouds...clouds and pale warm light. 

Between the rays of light, other shapes are slowly descending. Riku squints, trying to make out the outline.

Small orbs of light...falling like rain. 

...Hearts. 

_ Where...am I? Is _ this _ what lies beyond death? _

With some mixture of trepidation and a vague sense of guilt, Riku reaches out for one of the gently descending spheres nearest to him. His hand passes right through, as though the object is merely a projection and nothing more. 

It’s nothing like being so close to a truly unobscured heart. Or at the very least, not in his experience. 

Suddenly, there is a faint chiming noise to his right, and Riku jerks to look over his shoulder. 

Something...something is towering above him, even as he’s still seated in the middle of the cloud. It’s pale ivory, glinting oddly among the ambient light of this place, and he can make out a vaguely humanoid form within it’s silhouette. Feathers are clearly visible, shining on the long, long limbs of the odd being. 

Ever so slowly, Riku lets his eyes track upwards, holding his breath in trepidation. The figure stretches up, through the clouds that seem to continue upwards indefinitely, and it’s face, if it has one, is hidden from Riku’s line of sight. 

Nevertheless, a sick feeling of dread consumes him. It doesn’t smell like any Heartless are here...but that doesn’t mean whatever is standing above him like a looming sentinel is friendly. 

Riku takes a deep inhale, as quietly as possible, and begins to inch backwards off the cloud he’s sat on, away from the being as quietly as possible. Glancing down and to the side, it’s a great relief to see that there does seem to be flooring in this place, and he won’t pitch straight down through the sky if he falls. 

Gently, he slides off the edge of the cloud, butter soft against his skin, and lands lightly on luminescent marble floors, only a few feet down. 

Dead silence stretches out in every direction. Despite his best efforts, Riku can hear his harried breathing in his ears, as if his heart has journeyed up to pound away in his throat. 

This can’t be...this can’t be any sort of heaven. 

Riku crouches down, feeling the oddly firm texture of the cloud at his back. He doesn’t seem to have been noticed by anything...unsavory, yet. 

He swallows hard around the rock in his throat. 

Questions swirl through his mind in a grim waltz. If this truly is the afterlife, he’d hardly expect it to be so...so the same. His body still aches, with a pain even sharper that it had felt before. 

He tries not to look down at his body, too hard, afraid of what he’ll find, but the hair that still spills down around him is the first obvious tip off that the mutations he had accrued yet remain. 

The wings flex behind him, coming to rest gently against the surface of the cloud.

Unearthly chimes sound out, close by. 

Riku freezes. 

Something...something is very near. 

He rises to his feet, somewhat unsteadily, staying crouched low in the cover of the cloud to his back.

Over to his right, a foot steps down. A giant, gnarled, ivory, feathered foot. 

Riku drags his eyes up, and meets a countenance like an angry god. 

Just above him, staring down at him imperiously, a giant stands. It’s at least three buildings high, and Riku suddenly understands how geckoes feel when you lean down to chase them out of the house.

A multitude of blue eyes cover its face, every one trained on Riku, zeroed in like a hawk. Indeed, the unsettling face is adorned with a golden beak, jarring in the presence of otherwise humanoid facial structure. The being is feathered, and it’s four long limbs all seem to end in a motley fusion between bird claws and human hands.

It steps towards Riku with another chime. He grasps out for his keyblade in a panic.

It could be compared to a certain kind of ecstasy only found in life-threatening situations, that Braveheart comes to his hand as readily as ever. Indeed, among this place, it seems to have taken on a peculiar glow of its own, as though carrying some new or strengthened power with it. 

It’s with a certain measure of anticipated horror that he notes that the hand which takes hold of Braveheart is still bruised a deep blue-black, creeping up well past the elbow and up his bicep. 

Riku clenches his jaw, and rips his attention away from his skin to fall into battle stance. He has to adjust his hold on the keyblade, when his lengthened nails cut slightly into the meat of his palm, and it’s with a slight wince that he notes he was expecting it. 

Above him, the angelic behemoth regards him, every eye still pinned on his spot on the floor.

Riku bares his teeth up at it. 

_ I’m not...I haven’t come this far just to lose to you. _

“Cat got your tongue?” He snarks up at the unholy creature. 

The behemoth says nothing. Indeed, it gives no sign of recognition at all.

Riku doesn’t break their staring match. “If you’re planning to kill me, uglier things than you have tried and failed.”

_ Hah. _ He thinks about Xehanort’s smug face. _ Got ‘im. _

The being raises a disfigured hand, and slams it down on him. 

Riku dodges at the last second, and promptly stumbles when his wings catch on the momentum. He rights himself in an instant, an instant too long as the giant creature steps towards him, and swipes down at him again with ungainly limbs.

With a spin, Riku brings Braveheart down on the creature’s wrist with a resounding thwack. It seems to serve more to annoy rather than injure the beast, and Riku has to swiftly remove himself from the oncoming path of the other clawed hand. The same attack on the opposite wrist, and then again on a feathered ankle, serve simply to earn wide swipes of claws at his head.

The wings splay themselves against the air, almost without his express command, and in an instant Riku understands what he has to do. 

That doesn’t mean he doesn’t have to steal a moment to shove down the nerves in his chest. The air he inhales in that moment is a sweetness tinged with fear; thankfully enough to send him sprinting. 

His feet pound harshly against the smooth marble tiles. The wings arch, and with his heart in his mouth, Riku pushes against the ground, and surges upwards. 

It’s nothing like being carried by dear Komory Bat. His back muscles _ ache _with a vengeance, but with every straining flap of the wings, he understands them more. Whether they are placed at his back to mimic a dragon or a bat or a demon, they move as a true extension of him. 

(It’s as terrifying as it is exhilarating.)

Riku struggles upwards, no wind currents to help him along. Fighting against gravity, he leans into the curve of the wings on the air, and angles himself at the back of the creature’s head.

Before he can try any attacks on the back of its neck, the creature turns in a whirl belying it’s size, and fixes him with a glare from far too many eyes.

The blue gaze is startlingly direct, and Riku finds himself privately amazed the creature hasn’t attempted to speak to him yet. It certainly seems intelligent enough to do so, from how fast it tracks his movements, and understands his attacks. 

Riku grits his teeth. Allowing himself to fall back slightly, he attempts a few spells against the feathered skin of the creature.

If anything, the giant seems just as disappointed as Riku is when his Blizzaga fails to even ruffle the feathers of the beast. Firaga has the same effect, and before he can even attempt anything else, the creature rushes him, and he’s forced to duck and roll away. 

The struggle continues on. His attacks do nothing more than to annoy the behemoth, and with every second the gnarled claws pierce closer and closer to him. 

Backflipping out of a failed Thundaga, Riku finds himself locking eyes with the creature again. There’s something familiar about the blue eyes, but frankly, Riku’s not too interested in dissecting it while eight foot bird claws are getting increasingly closer to his vital organs.

...the dance continues on.

It’s with great jubilee that Riku discovers Braveheart is at least doing some damage to the behemoth. Slices against the places where feathers do not hide leave behind wounds of pale blue blood, dripping in luminescence.

The creature makes a harsh noise when his hits land as successful small wounds. The claws that reach out to pierce and grasp him become more frantic, and Riku finds himself sailing out of a few close calls with some abrasions of his own.

There is no wind, in this place. It’s a fact that Riku becomes grateful for quickly enough, when he lands down on his feet again for bare moments of respite. It gives him a moment to paw away at the hair that has fallen into his eyes, whipping around and in to his face like yet another combatant he’s being forced to beat. 

...he’s certainly never had this much hair before. Even when he let it grow out during his year undercover, it had never come to more than his mid back. In this moment, it feels more akin to having a bed sheet attached to his head. 

Wrenching the pale strands out of his vision, Riku glares up at his adversary. That same pale blue blood drips off the edges of its beak, but the many eyes remain trained on him, unblinking.

He raises Braveheart again, and narrows his eyes. “Just die why don’t you!!” With that declarative, he jumps forward for the face again, the wings snapping to attention.

_ It’s time to end this...if I can. I can’t hold back any longer. _

His keyblade cleanly cuts into one of the larger eyes, and the organ promptly explodes, into a gooey yellow mass that streaks and splatters across him.

The creature screams in agony, a terrible piercing shriek that Riku can barely hear properly, and it’s clawed hands reach up to tear at his position on it’s face, rending new rips and tears into the skin of his back and wings.

Riku gasps for air, and turns Braveheart on the next large eye. This too results in it’s destruction, and the shrieks of the being increase in pitch.

Raising it above his head, he brings the keyblade down into the next eye, and the next, and the next, and the next. The blue substance that splatters onto him is almost acidic in nature, and Riku would swear he could feel it burning where it touches his bare skin.

The behemoth staggers, and Riku’s perch on its face is suddenly very unsteady. He finds himself clinging to the face, uncaring of what bloody remnants are getting onto him.

“Urk!!” Riku hisses as there’s another swing of jagged claws quite close to him, but it’s clear that now that the being lacks any functioning eyes, it’s aim is considerably less accurate. 

They sway, suspended as the giant fights for it’s balance. Not without some guilt at the extent of his actions, Riku stabs Braveheart into the largest eye socket to help it along. It lands with a squelching noise, a grieving sort of finality, and Riku’s heart pounds harshly in his ears.

Time hangs in the balance for a split second, and then….

Finally, finally, the creature collapses. The resulting crash sends Riku hurtling through the air, and not even his wings can fight against the momentum fast enough to save him.

He slams into one cloud from the side, and is sent spiralling face down into another. The only noise is that of his own impact, and he struggles upright as fast as he can, twisting to locate his opponent. 

The behemoth lies still. Riku slowly slides down from the cloud he’d fell upon, and paces toward it cautiously. Braveheart sits in his grip, still at the ready.

It is pure silence, between the golden clouds.

A _ crack _ resounds, and Riku jerks at the sudden noise. 

The behemoth splits in twain, directly down the middle. Like a wine glass cracking once, and then shattering, in the next instant the cracks multiply into a multitude of diamond fissures, radiating from the initial split. 

Immediatly, the fragments spill outwards, no longer coalesced into unholy form. When they hit the marble, they shatter further, spiralling upwards in pearly streams of dust.

The being is no more.

Riku turns away, feeling as though tears are rising up behind his eyes. He can’t tell why. No words seem to fit to this peculiar emotion.

Braveheart fades away gently, and Riku takes a shuddering breath, as he stumbles onward. The marble is cool against his feet, but somehow, for the first time in awhile, he feels _ warm _.

(There’s blood trickling down his right arm, from where he dodged too late and a claw was reaching out for his heart. His weariness is such that he barely even notices.)

Taking note of the distance he must have covered in the fight, no small amount indeed, he sees that a break in the clouds is up ahead. The marble stretches on, seemingly without end, but the clouds up ahead are fading away slowly, pure light obscuring what lies ahead.

_ Hm? Is that a way out? Or… _

Riku exhales, and soldiers on. 

Here, amongst the beginning of the brightening of the light, the marble is cracked and chipped away in places, and those small craters are filled with water, glimmering amid the odd mixture of light. They glint like glass within the parody of dawn, and Riku kneels down to inspect the water closer.

He’s not quite prepared for his reflection, even if it was all but inevitable by now. 

Feverish rosy eyes stare back at him, reflected sharply in how still and smooth the water is. His hair hangs in a loose curtain, a little past his waist now, and a shade removed from his normal grey: well past the margin into pure white. 

The shadows cast by his wings left akimbo behind him obscure some of his features into shadow, and Riku can’t help but be grateful for that. He raises a discolored hand to his face, and the nameless feeling that wells up in him at the sight is enough to choke on.

The shirt he wore to go to bed that night is now in tatters. It’s barely holding onto it’s form as it is, and the battle just now hasn’t help affairs. The wings poke through with awkward civility, twitching slightly as Riku attempts to catch his breath.

The horns are impossible to ignore now. They’ve gone from meer nubs to twisting up into proper curves of their own, now extending up from the crown of his head by about half a foot.

The sight of their gnarled and blackened shape makes some part of his insides twist into specially shaped knots. Knots shaped like an austere face, smiling down at him with a twisted sweetness. A certain skeletal hand resting gently on his shoulder.

_ A monster. That’s who’s looking at me right now. _

Riku stands and simply turns away from his own reflection, ignoring his exhaustion from the battle. It’s time to go.

Go? Go where? Anywhere. Anywhere elsewhere than here.

_ Go forward. What you seek is not here. _

Riku stops in his tracks. It...it would be too much to say that voice could ever be a _ comfort _to him, but in it’s familiarity it does something to quell the pang in his chest. It echoes round from deep within, and the presence it carries with it is muted in it’s identity.

“Ansem. You’re not supposed to exist anymore.”

Even as he says it, he knows there will be no reply, and that Ansem at this point is nothing more than a memory, and a faint sonorous whisper telling him to eat the last serving of Captain Crumble for a mid-afternoon snack without telling anyone.

“...even you can’t help me here.” 

His voice, and ensuing sigh, seem to echo loudly against the clouds, and Riku’s not in the mood to discern how those particular acoustics are functioning. His mind is already whirling again, trying to produce answers he simply does not have.

It’s with a sense of dignity regained that he marches forward, and faintly notes in the back of his mind that while his own voice sounds out with a peculiar reverberation, his footsteps don’t make any noise here. 

The light grows brighter the more he strides towards the cloud line, as if breaking through the edge of a deep forest. Riku raises a hand to shield his eyes, and steps forward into the white. 

He emerges, with the same smooth marble still under his feet. Riku blinks hard to clear his vision of spots, and looks up. 

A palace rises up before him, made of white stone and ivory and gleaming colorless crystals. The construction is jarringly haphazard, and a simplicity lies within the design that belies architecture itself. Clouds, wispy clouds, proper clouds, dance round the pillars and arches that crown the structure, swaying in a nonexistent wind.

Riku sees absolutely none of it.

Not twenty feet ahead of him, there is a cloud, a cloud colored in soft gold like the one he fell onto. It rests not far off the ground, hanging low as if too lazy to rise any higher into the air with it’s brethren.

On it rests Sora, laying peacefully under a sheet of red silk. Not a Shade-Sora, like the ones with shadowy limbs and piercing blue eyes, or even a Sora that flickers away when you try to look at him, smiling softly in shades of mist and gone from view in the next instant.

In fact, the longer that Riku looks at him, the more _ real _ he appears. His hair is messed up, pressed against his cheek where he’s leaning on the cloud. His posture is relaxed, and even from here Riku can see the rise and fall of his chest, slow and gentle as in slumber.

It only takes one moment, a barest glancing strike of a hesitation born out of shock.

And in that one moment, Riku does not think at all, he _ runs _.

* * *

This ocean breeze is achingly unfamiliar.

Kairi’s hands are on her hips as she huffs towards the view of the sea. It’s humid, and the salty scent on the breeze is reminiscent of home just enough to make her...a little more on edge.

Alighting in this world, her clothes have been replaced with a simple rose colored shirt, tucked loosely into black pants. It’s a bit of an adjustment, but at least not as much as having her whole body briefly become entirely inhuman. The people in this town near to where her portal had landed are dressed much the same, in either loose peasant garb or militaristic suits. The buildings here do not look old, and as expected for a seafaring town, the locale is somewhat rough.

Kairi attempts to keep a low profile for the most part. Hopefully, between her baggy clothes, short hair, and diminutive stature, no one will pick her out of the crowd as a young girl...alone...in the streets as darkness falls.

She keeps to where the people are. Nightfall is beginning to settle in, and the view of the water out to the West is burning orange and purple. 

As darkness falls gently, people begin to trickle off the streets, closing up shops and heading home for the evening. Kairi bites down on her bottom lip, and ducks into the doorway of the nearest bustling establishment she sees.

It happens to be a tavern because of _ course _ it is. It can’t be wise to linger out in the darkened streets, but it hardly seems better to march into the room full of rowdy drunken men. 

She tucks herself as far back into the hollow of the entryway as she can. Riku wouldn’t be here...he wouldn’t. So her best bet is to find the crown charm, wherever it is, and skedaddle. 

For the sake of being thorough, she gives the open area of the tavern a good scan from her vantage point. No moody silver haired Keyblade Master in sight. Not a single one.

However...

“And just what, are _ you _doing here?”

Kairi only has time to make a small ‘eep!’ of surprise, and is promptly whirled around by the shoulder, away from the door. 

Lea looks down on her with a sigh. “Why am I not surprised.” 

He too, is dressed in clothing that fits the theme of this world, and it’s an odd sight to see him with his hair pulled back by a bandana and not in it’s usual mane. 

Kairi attempts to wriggle loose from his grip. “H-how...surprising...to see you here…” She manages to slip free slightly, as Lea relaxes his hold on her shoulder. 

He raises an eyebrow at her. “This is surprising? Well, you can imagine how surprised I was when Naminé called me at two in the morning to say you had decided to go on a world tour all on your lonesome.”

Batting his hand off her shoulder, Kairi juts her chin out at him. “And? You’re not my babysitter.” 

_ Namin _ _ é… _

This was exactly the outcome she had hoped to have avoided. 

Lea sighs. “No, I’m not. But I am your friend, aren’t I?” He fixes her with a look that’s a little more knowing than Kairi would like. 

She fidgets slightly, and looks away. “I was doing just fine on my own…”

To be fair she still hasn’t, y’know, _ succeeded _. But details, details.

Lea continues to look down at her. “I’m sure.” His voice is a little tart, in a fashion that she’s used to by now.

Kairi resists the urge to grind her teeth. “...If that’s all, I have things to do.” She turns away, trying not to show the exhaustion in her face, or her desire for this conversation to be over.

It’s fine. She can do this no problem. She’ll eventually come across Riku at this rate...right? 

Right?

_ Riku...maybe I’ll up that from one jaw punch to two. Making me worry like this… _

_ Or just a good old slap. _

She can already feel Lea going to grab her shoulder again. “Kairi, wait-”

Kairi does not wait, abandons dignity to the wind, and _ sprints _. She can hear Lea’s footfalls behind her, annoyingly close, and makes a sharp turn around the edge of the tavern. 

Her breath sounds harshly in her own ears. She barely even knows why she’s running like this. Wouldn’t it be easier to just...let him help? She could probably convince Lea to come with her...an extra pair of eyes. 

The sound of her feet pounding in the sand drums out like a heartbeat. This, this is where she has the advantage in this chase. Years of running on the beach whereas Lea is less used to such slippery terrain. 

Before her, the ocean stretches out, dark and impassive. The sun has finally slipped beneath the surf, leaving the the orange and pink streaked waves to fade into memory. 

Her feet carry her forward, unthinking. The surf splashes against her bare ankles, and she can feel her breath catch in her chest. 

The sound of Lea catching up to her is incredibly close. There’s nowhere to hide, where, where-

Oh. Of course.

Kairi takes a deep, deep breath, holds it tight, and dives into the water. 

There is very little thought behind the action. What’s she going to do? Wait there until he goes away? Hopefully he won’t notice...though the splash was sure to be obvious...

It’s unsurprisingly very dark, here under the ocean at night. Kairi squeezes her eyes shut, and hopes she’s not deep enough to attract the attention of any volatile wildlife.

_ Didn’t Sora once talk about using a keyblade underwater? _

_ I wonder if I- _

Her eyes fly open in the next instant, and all thoughts of keyblade magic and underwater portals flee from her mind as a wiry arm snakes around her waist and pulls her straight upwards. She kicks out against the pull, but unfortunately, the grip is too firm to break out of this time. 

They crest through the water’s surface with a loud splash, and Kairi gasps for breath. In the next moment, she’s being hauled out of the water entirely and onto the sandbar, and set down slightly more gently than one would handle a wet bag of potatoes.

Lea flops down next to her, panting. “First thing-” He stops to inhale harshly. “What the _ hell _ were you-” He pauses again to take another ragged breath. “-thinking. Second of all.” He holds up a finger while he continues to catch his breath. 

Kairi curls in on herself before he can carry on any further, hiding her face in her arms and drenched blouse, and says nothing.

_ How can I explain in words that I just wanted one chance? One chance, to do something big, and brave, and good...things that all of you do so often. _

_ It doesn’t matter. I don’t care anymore. I don’t care. _

_ I just want Riku back. _

“You do know you’re glowing, right?” Lea’s voice is a little gentler this time.

Kairi blinks, and it takes another moment for his question to truly sink in. 

“...huh?”

Raising her head slowly, Kairi stares numbly at her arms. What had formerly been an odd luminescence, like a pale sheen beneath her skin has now grown into a veritable phosphorescence. 

She glows, emanating light like a lantern in human form. 

It must go for a little too long that she lacks a response, for soon enough Lea is tapping her glowing shoulder lightly. “Kairi? Kairi? You in there?”

_ What...what’s happening to me...? _

She turns to face him then, and the expression on her face must really be something else, for it only takes a moment before Lea wraps her up into a drenched hug. They’re both still soaking wet, so it’s not a very comfortable hug, but it’s a hug nonetheless.

Kairi sniffles slightly, and apparently, that’s the only crack necessary for the floodgates to break open, and the next thing she knows, she’s openly bawling into Lea’s chest.

Lea doesn’t flinch, and his arms only tighten slightly around her.

_ ...why did I think I could do this? _

Her shoulders shake uncontrollably. 

_ ...they’re right to not let me do things like this. _

It’s that thought that makes her extricate herself from Lea’s arms. He’s watching her carefully, expression concerned.

Kairi rubs at her eyes, and tries not to focus on the brilliant aura of her hands when she brings them up to her face. “...m’ sorry for running away from you.” She doesn’t look at Lea as she says it. 

_ ...I am. I’m sorry I can’t figure this out. _

_ Riku...Sora would’ve found you by now, and brought you home. _

_ ...I’m sorry, Riku. I don’t know how...how to be like... _

The piercing look that Lea carries around with him when he thinks no one is looking is firmly trained on her at the moment. “No need to apologize.” 

She unconsciously sniffles again, and for a moment, contemplates going back to hide in the circle of her friend’s arms. The urge strengthens for a moment, but then-

There, it glints against the radiance coming off of her skin.

Nestled in the sand…a crown shaped charm.

She leans over to it, and swipes her hand loosely against the charm. It fades away with nary a trace left behind. 

_ [7/10 Shadow Fragments Released] _

Lea gives her an odd look, but before he can open his mouth, Kairi sneezes. Not a dainty, Princess of Heart sneeze, but an I’ve-been-in-the-ocean-on-a-somewhat-chilly-night sneeze. 

It rings out against the empty beach with enough force that Lea finally cracks a wry grin at her, and hauls her to her feet. “That’s it. We’re leaving this world before you go playing mermaid again.” His head tilts to the side, and he gives her a considering look. “But first…”

Before Kairi can wonder too long about what _ that _look specifically means, Lea steps back slightly, and without further ado, his hands light up in a flurry of sparks. 

A ring of fire circles Kairi, orbiting her in the air.. The Fira is controlled enough to dry her clothes and hair without singeing her, and it’s only after the magical flames fade away that Kairi becomes conscious of how cool the night wind on the beach really is. 

Her eyes are stinging slightly from all the crying, and she paws at her now-dry face miserably. 

Lea’s constantly glowing keyblade flashes into his hand in the next moment. He inclines his head slightly at her, and at this point they’ve spent enough time together that Kairi knows to interpret it as a silent _ ‘you ready to blow this joint?’ _.

Something itches in the back of her mind, a firm and insistent nudge that she has unfinished business. There has to be a way to continue on...if only she could just…

Kairi shakes her head, feeling a little woozy despite herself. “...let me.” 

Before Lea can argue, she calls Destiny’s Embrace to hand and brandishes it, pointing it forward down the beach. 

_ Riku… _

_ I can’t afford to doubt myself. Not even if I know I won’t succeed. I have to believe I can find you. _

_ I...it’s all bubbling over in my chest. I don’t know how to stand it. _

_ Is this...love? _

_ ...I won’t make you wait any longer. _

_ I’m coming, Riku. _

A beam of light like liquid silver shoots out from the tip of the keyblade, and Kairi feels something in her chest harden. 

She’s getting closer. She _has _to be.

* * *

  
  


_ Who...who is that...that person shouting… _

_ I wish they would be quiet… _

_ Can’t they see how peaceful I am? _

_ Maybe...if I wake up for just a little bit...I could tell them to be quiet. _

_ ...nah. I’m so comfortable right here. _

_ Ngh...but why...why does the sadness feel so much worse? _

_ M...maybe whoever’s shouting knows the faces I can’t get out of mind… _

_ I should wake up and ask. _

_ But… _

_ I’m sure just a few more minutes won’t hurt. _

  
  



	7. Into the Light

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lay down your sweet and weary head. Night is falling.

This world is sparkling.

The city glimmers bright under the moonlight. Buildings rise up all around them, towering overhead, like benevolent glittery giants. Glass beams with the brightness of an artificial moon.

Kairi stands, buried in the comfort of a brand new hoodie. It’s just past ten at night, according to the fluorescent clock on the skyscraper just ahead. The night air isn’t particularly chilly here, but…

Once she and Lea had alighted in this world and surveyed the area, it had become glaringly obvious some adjustment would have to be made. 

Kairi glows, like a tube of neon sculpted into human form. It’s like she’s been injected with pure brilliance, something that runs just beneath her skin and turns her into a self-sustaining light source. It shines through her clothes in a blatant way, and it’s with a wordless glance that she and Lea exchange understanding. 

(They could just go home. It’s in that glance that Kairi sees the thought in Lea’s mind. But her gaze remains firm. If anyone knows the strength of her determination by now, it’s Lea.)

Thus, a newly purchased hoodie and leggings, as well as a face mask with a cute cat mouth embroidered on it. It doesn’t quite contain it all, but it cuts down on the amount of traffic incidents Kairi could potentially cause if she stayed in her not-quite-knee-length sleeveless dress. 

For now, they’ve situated themselves in a small walkway area between two large buildings, seated on the edge of a public fountain. Coins glitter under the surface of the water, and Kairi watches them shimmer absentmindedly.

Neither of them have said much since arriving, other than Kairi offering a quiet murmur of thanks when Lea helps her pay for the clothes. He seems to be giving her time to sort her thoughts out, and Kairi’s grateful for it. She’s barely had any time to sit down and have a moment to breathe today. 

There is a small amount of guilt that the non-action carries with it. The idea that her lack of movement will cause Riku to slip further away, out of the range within which she could ever grasp him again. 

_ Catastrophic thinking. I remember that from a book that Father had.  _

_ It’s not like Riku has never done any strange or concerning things before, and it’s turned out alright, but...I thought we were beginning to move past that.  _

_ …….usually it’s Sora who’s able to get him out of it anyway. _

Lea nudges her shoulder, drawing her out of her thoughts. “So. What gives?” His voice is quiet, lowered enough that anyone wandering by would have to strain to hear them.

Kairi answers in the same quiet tone. “...which part?” 

There’s still a sob lingering in the back of her throat, but the tears have stopped for now. If the dam breaks again, who knows if she’ll even be able to go on.

Lea’s eyes are on the city. “You really don’t know why you’re glowing? Bright enough that you were like a searchlight underwater.”

Everything in her feels slightly hollowed out. “I don’t.” It’s barely more than a whisper.

He hums noncommittally, and turns to look at her. “It...it doesn’t hurt, right?” His brows are furrowed, and Kairi knows him well enough by now that she can see the slight panic he’s trying to hide in the set of his shoulders. 

She shakes her head. “No. I feel fine.” There is no energy with which to elaborate with. 

And she does. Really. Regardless of what’s making her skin do very unnatural things, there is no strong sensation coupled with it. Unless you were to count the growing anxiety clawing around in the pit of her stomach, but frankly, Kairi’s fairly certain that’s an issue of correlation and not causation.

Lea is watching her reaction carefully. “...you’re sure.”

He can’t see her attempt a wan smile under the face mask, but she tries to lighten her voice. “I’m sure. Who knows, maybe it’s just a weird princess thing.”

_ I have...a heart of pure light. Don’t I? Maybe this is just another one of those things I end up doing without really trying. _

Her friend lets out a huffed exhale. “Couldn’t tell you.” He fixes her with a stern look. “You’ll need to speak to Master Yen Sid about this. He or Merlin might know something.”

It’s a small and gentle warmth, the pleasant feeling that the concern in Lea’s eyes gives her. “Mm. I’ll...do that.” She amends the statement after he raises an eyebrow at her. “Soon.” 

_ I’m...not alone. I know I’m not. Even if I’m scared underneath it all...I don’t have to be alone.  _

_ Riku...Sora...I’m scared that you’re both alone right now. _

That seems to satisfy him for the moment, but Kairi can still see him sneaking worried glances at her gleaming forehead where the hood doesn’t quite cover it. “...right.”

Kairi forces herself to stir and gives him a playful nudge with her elbow. “It’s alright, Lea. I’m sure it’ll go away soon.”

_ I...it will, right? Maybe there was something weird in that slushie. _

_ ...I’m really scared. _

Lea teasingly bats at her elbow in response, but it’s clear enough from the look on his face her comment doesn’t actually assuage him in the slightest. “...Kairi?”

The streets are beginning to empty slightly. It’s getting quite late.

_ If you’re going to go on, now is the time.  _

Huh? Where...where did that thought come from?

_ He’ll slow you down. _

She turns to look at Lea, tilting her head in question. “Hmm?”

The conversation is interrupted there, as Kairi’s stomach chooses to make itself known by way of a primeval growl. 

They stare blankly at each other for a moment before Kairi ducks her head to hide a bashful giggle, and a smile finally manages to crack through into Lea’s demeanor. He stands, and puts his hands on his hips. “I bet you a hundred munny I can be back here with something to eat in ten minutes.”

Kairi hurriedly waves her hands in dissent. “No, I’m fine-”

_ Now. Now. Now. Now. Now. Now. Now. _

Lea is already waving off her concern. “Nonsense. We’ll be able to hunt for Mister Renegade better if you’re not starving.” 

It seems pointless to resist this opportunity. A road paved with golden light...as if her path is already laid out by fate, pleading her to tread it.

Kairi inclines her head. “Well...I  _ guess  _ I wouldn’t say no to some ice cream right now…”

Lea smiles the widest he has so far this evening. “Well, I’m your man for that.” He strikes a pose, a bit of his normal bravado flooding back from the sternness he’s been carrying around with him. “Don’t go anywhere!”

She nods in reassurance, but to attempt a smile underneath the mask simply to seal the package is too great a request. 

Lea turns to go, but not before whirling around once. “You’re not going to run off on me again...right?”

The stress already sitting in Kairi’s temples increases in intensity. “Of course not.”

_ I’m sorry, Lea. _

He gives her a firm nod, eyes bright, and finally sets off at a brisk pace.

Kairi watches him go with a sensation akin to watching a ship leave the harbor, a jaunty shape that fades into the light of the skyline before disappearing altogether. Once he’s safely disappeared around the corner, Kairi shifts, going to stand. 

Something sparkles in her periphery. Mingled with the coins in the bottom of the fountain, a crown charm sparkles darkly, enticing. 

Rolling up the sleeves of the hoodie, Kairi reaches into the water to brush it into non-existence. 

_ [8/10 Shadow Fragments Released] _

The water is cool against her arms, and the light emanating off of her skin makes the surface of the water sparkle into little rainbows. 

The lingering guilt rises up in her chest, and Kairi tries not to wince. There’s no two ways about it.

_ I’m...I am sorry, Lea. I can only hope you’ll forgive me when I get back.  _

_ When? It really feels like more of an ‘if’ at this point.  _

She stands from her perch on the fountain’s rim. It’s time to move forward. 

_ ...I guess it really is anything. I’d do anything for the two of them.  _

She’s so close...she can’t hesitate anymore. The ache in her chest burns even more hollow with every minute that passes, and every world she crosses. 

Destiny’s Embrace comes to her hand in a gentle flare, and for some reason, it feels almost painful to hold against her skin. 

Kairi raises the keyblade and takes a deep breath. 

_ Onward.  _

Dust fills her nose, and she nearly chokes on it.

This place…

The graveyard of keyblades stretches out before her, pale and dull under the cover of night. 

Kairi takes one step forward. The sandy dust is disturbed by her foot falls, but her gaze remains grim and determined. 

Another step forward. 

Above her, the heart shaped moon takes up almost the entire sky. 

With hands that are a little wobbly, she takes the face mask off, stuffing it into a pocket, and lowers her hood. 

Radiance emits off of her, reflected and seemingly magnified by every strand of hair. She’s glowing through her clothes, and even the leather of her boots is almost turned to translucence. Something carved from glass, only tinted with the colors of humanity as a cosmic afterthought.

Kairi gulps, and begins marching forward, not letting herself pause to think. 

The graveyard is quiet under the touch of night, and no sound echoes out except her footfalls. The keyblades that lay resting here, either standing in the dirt and dust or clattered together in heaps all around, shine dully under the moonlight.

The ancient walls that rose out of the ground during their last time here are nowhere to be seen. It does make it easier to navigate, and soon Kairi finds herself wandering to the crossroads where they first came face to face with the thirteen. 

There, in the center of where the four lanes converge, something sparkles in the dust of the ground. 

_ …!! _

Kairi dashes forward, forgetting caution for the moment, and dives to reach the glittering crown charm.

_ [9/10 Shadow Fragments Released] _

Something stirs in her chest, and Kairi jerks her gaze up to Kingdom Hearts.

It seems to be glowing brighter now, but maybe it’s a trick of her imagination. It looms above her, and Kairi feels a sharp tug in her ribcage the longer she looks at it. 

_ I...what is this feeling? _

She stands slowly, and doesn’t dare tear her eyes away from the unholy moon above her. The moment becomes sacrosanct in that instant.

Something...something clicks, and releases. A death knell tolling out perhaps, or maybe just the rustling of the wind.

In a movement that sends her heart into her throat, Kairi’s feet lift off the ground of their own accord, and before she can even make a sound of surprise, she’s rising off the dusty plateau with a speed that bears no contradiction.

Kairi struggles helplessly in mid air, and reaches blindly for Destiny’s Embrace. The light is growing around her. Maybe she’s getting closer to the white being in the sky...or she’s simply burning up with greater intensity. 

...or both.

Destiny’s Embrace does not come to her hand. 

Kairi lets her arms flop helplessly, limp as her ascent continues. The ground is now very far below her, and to fall from this height would spell certain death. 

The darkness of night is all but canceled out around her, as the light builds and builds. She’s forced to squeeze her eyes shut as it blossoms around her, too painful to look at now. 

_ ……….!!! I’m… _

_ I feel warm. It’s not...it’s not painful. _

_ It...feels like I’m falling asleep…. _

_ I can barely keep my eyes open………. _

_ ….no. _

_ I can’t. I can’t sleep at a moment like this. _

Kairi forces her eyes open and glares into an unnatural midday. Her whole body feels drained, and insubstantial. 

_ Funny. It almost reminds me...of when I was inside S- _

The air drops out from beneath her, and suddenly Kairi is plummeting towards the ground with a shriek.

The sure certainty that a fall from this height will snap her spine and crush her skull in a mere instant catches in her throat, and then-

All the momentum vanishes, and Kairi finds herself nearly nose to nose with cracked white pavement, hanging suspended precariously close to the ground. 

In the next moment, said suspension relaxes, and Kairi does a belly flop onto cold, hard stone pavement. It’s only from a few inches above said pavement, so it’s not quite the death sentence she was expecting, but that’s not to say it’s comfortable. 

Kairi holds her head, as she rolls over and sits up, making a groaning sound. “H...hello?”

There is no answer except the faint whistle of the wind. A sunny midmorning stretches out around her, with the scent of salt on the air. Seagulls soar above, but they make no discernable sound.

She glances around in befuddlement. This place is...odd. It’s not at all like any of the worlds she’s seen so far. 

For one, it seems to be completely empty. A ruined city stretches up and around her, and white stone rubble is scattered every which way she looks. It’s...some sort of island city, and as Kairi peers around, it becomes clear that it’s nestled among many others like it. 

She begins wandering forward. The sidewalk cuts off at a certain point, as if someone or something has taken a bite out of it, so she skirts around it, and further into the strange city. 

_ I wonder what happened here...what happened to make all the people go away? _

Lifting her hands to cup round her mouth, Kairi raises her voice. “Riku!!”

There is no response. 

Kairi grits her teeth and shouts his name again, to the same response of utterly nothing. Her glowing hands clench into fists at her sides. 

This continues for awhile. How long exactly, Kairi can not be sure. She continues her trek throughout the white city, and finds no one.

Sometime after wandering down the nth ruined street and seeing nothing beyond rubble, the day begins to catch up with Kairi, slowly, and then all at once. 

_ I’ve never felt this alone before. I don’t know what to do.  _

All at once, a swell of emotion rises within her chest. She throws a hand out, and calls for her keyblade. 

Destiny’s Embrace, once again, ignores her call. Her hand remains empty, grasping uselessly against the wind. 

A sob chokes it’s way out of Kairi’s throat, as a dull ache within her chest grows in intensity.

_ So this is the worth of my talent. _

_ I wonder what Master Yen Sid would say. _

Biting back tears, she tugs her Gummiphone out of her pocket, with the intent of trying to reach Namin é.  The screen remains black, no matter how many buttons she presses. No further tinkering provokes any sort of response.

Kairi bites down on her bottom lip to keep from crying, and stuffs it back into her pocket. 

It would appear she’s on her own for this one. 

With a deep breath, she marches on. Down paved streets and little avenues, ducking under arches and hopping around ruined and crumbling stone.

The nothingness continues on. The world holds its breath in anticipation.

Kairi thinks naught of it, and simply trails her feet down the same trail that her heart decides. The wind rustles in her shimmering hair.

Soon enough, she wanders down to the water’s edge, and hangs her head. Perhaps it flickers within her subconscious as something that reminds her of home, even if the blue of the water here is inexplicable different from the ocean that embraces the Destiny Islands. 

The wind continues it’s whispering around her. The sun is almost mocking in its brightness. 

Regret begins to sink in, from where it’s been swirling around in the very pit of her stomach up to now. Kairi lets herself drop to her knees, and buries her face in her still-glowing hands. 

_ If only I had stayed with Lea. If only I hadn’t left at all. _

_ Sora would’ve found you by now, wouldn’t he. _

Kairi sniffles into her hands, and before she can stop them, diamond tears start trickling down her face. They refract like gems, sending the light coming off her skin into little rainbows and spotlights. 

_ Is this...is this numbness what a Nobody feels? I hurt and hurt and hurt...but I can barely feel anything. _

_ Sora. Is this what you felt the first time you lost us? _

The wind echoes in her ears with an especial strength. It carries enough emphasis with it that Kairi slowly raises her head despite herself. 

She’s kneeled at the edge, right where the pavement drops away into the blueness of whatever ocean or sea it is that surrounds these peculiar town islands. 

There, laid out before her like a present, Sora and Riku are floating just beneath the surface of the water, just close enough to touch if she reaches her hand in. 

Sora is dressed in the clothes she last saw him in, the blacks and reds of his enchanted outfit. Riku, on the other hand, is dressed in the simple pajamas he had worn last night. Their hands are gently clasped together, as they float in tandem. 

They are perfectly still, as if in sleep, eyes closed and faces calm.

Without ever realizing how she got there, Kairi finds herself bent over the water, leaning out and away from solid ground. Her knuckles are white, and the sound her breath makes catching against the air is of the volume of a pin dropping in an empty cathedral. 

In the softly swaying surface of the water, her reflection glows with enough brightness that it blocks out the image of the two beneath the water, and it shines with such dispassion that Kairi can’t even make out her own face in the reflection.

She rears back, and now the features of her two dearest friends are clearer once they’ve been removed from her brightness, wreathed in shadows as they are. 

There are no thoughts in her mind.

She almost hates to disturb their peace. Riku’s face is only ever relaxed in sleep on some nights, but now he looks finally carefree. Sora is the same, and isn’t it odd and a bit terrifying to see someone so energetic lay so still. 

Nonetheless, there is a quiet upturn to his lips even in apparent slumber. He’s laying turned towards Riku slightly, where his hand is curled in the other’s.

Kairi is not prone to overthinking. She holds onto the things she loves with a passion, but when times of difficulty come, she prefers to act rather than sit still and worry out the details. That’s always been Riku’s job, after all. 

Thusly, she does not think. Simply acts. Simply dives towards what is most precious to her. Reaches towards them with both hands, and  _ moves _ .

She cuts into the water with a loud splash, that she is not there to see. Only the seagulls wheeling above would ever know. 

Sadly, only darkness awaits her. 

_ [10/10 Shadow Fragments Released] _

  
  


* * *

_ I am not alone.  _

_ There’s something here with me.  _

_ ...two? Two somethings? _

_ I...I can see them!! _

_ A demon...there is a demon embracing me. I...should I be scared? _

_ His arms are gentle. He’s looking at me like he knows me. _

_ ...and there. On the other side. An angel is looking down on us. I can barely see her face but… _

_ Her radiance is warm. Why do I... _

_ They’re both so beautiful. _

_ ...so why do I feel so panicked?! _

_ I...I have to wake up...I have to wake up…….I have to wake up……. _

_ The light is so warm. I want to wake up so badly but… _

_ It’s so warm. _   
  
  


* * *

  
  


This is known as catharsis.

He doesn’t even register the steps that happen between him and his goal. One instant he is standing numb, completely dumbstruck, and the next he finds himself leaning over the body of the boy who’s been haunting both his heart and his peripheral vision.

Riku crouches over Sora’s sleeping form, his body frozen still in a multitude of warring voices. 

His friend is perfectly asleep from what he can tell. His eyes are shut, lashes dark against his face. 

Two months...two months that etched themselves into his memory in their greyness. Two months, the memories mixing themselves together in the apathy and hurt woven into them. 

With his heart in his throat, Riku reaches for Sora’s shoulder, barely daring to breathe. He doesn’t hesitate until he looks down and-

Oh. 

Oh, this won’t do. He can’t possibly attempt to touch Sora with blackened and gnarled hands that look as though they’re on the edge of decay. 

It...it wouldn’t be right. He recoils, more from himself than Sora.

_ Who am I kidding. Things like ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ have never mattered when it came to how I felt about Sora.  _

_ Nor when it came to what I would do to keep him safe.  _

Though his chest is clogged with ten thousand things he’s never said aloud, Riku forces himself to speak anyway. 

“...Sora.”

That alone almost does him in, and tears that were already blossoming in his eyes now gather in abundance, as his discovery sinks in. 

Riku’s breath hitches, and he fights to keep it calm. “Sora. I...found you.” His voice is hushed to his own ears, and the sleeping boy before him does not stir. 

“Sora.” That name on his lips in this moment is the best thing he’s ever tasted. “Please wake up.” 

Sora doesn’t move. His breathing is so gentle that Riku has to strain to hear it at all. 

By now the tears have clouded his vision, and Riku has to blink hard to clear it. His vision feels murky for some reason, as if the light is fading away around them. He pays it no mind. His attention is intent on something far more important.

Sora’s necklace is missing. His silver chain necklace with the crown charm, the one that Riku had originally been given as a birthday gift from his parents, the one that he’d later given to Sora. The one that Sora had practically never taken off since. 

He’s reaching out before he can stop himself, but again jerks back halfway. It seems such an egregious act, to dare to touch someone so pure with such hands bruised into inhumanity.

“Sora.” He can barely speak around the heart in his throat, but somehow his voice grows louder. “Sora. Wake up.”

Sora’s body lays still and silent. 

“Sora. For the love of-” He’s forced to draw in a sharp breath. “ _ Wake up, Sora _ .” 

The gentle form lying beneath him does not stir. With a start, Riku realises he’s bent over the body on all fours, with no memory of how he got into that position. 

He draws back instinctively, now kneeling next to Sora’s gently rising and falling chest. It feels very hard to breathe for some reason.

A sob catches there, on the lump in his throat. He can’t, he can’t-

Some sort of garbled mess of Sora’s name tears from his throat in a scream, and Riku ducks his head, breathing hard. 

_ He’s still breathing. You can hear him breathing from here. He’s not dead. He’s not dead. He’s not dead.  _

_ I’ve woken him up before. I can do it again.  _

Tears are now making their way down his face in a parade of mourning and celebration, but Riku barely notices them. He can feel his mouth twitch into a fraction of a smile. 

“Still sleeping, are you. Leaving me to do all the work again.” His voice, as he hears it in his own ears, is hushed, and achingly fond.

_ ...huh? _

His tears, where they’re falling from his face and onto the red blanket that Sora is wrapped in, are pitch black, a substance thicker than water, like a blood tinted black with pure darkness. They stain where they touch down, even as he frantically turns his face away so as to not let the tears fall onto Sora himself. 

After sniffling into his hands for a long moment, he reigns the blackened tears back in, and looks back to Sora with an emotion he doesn’t know how to describe. It is something hollow, something made so something else can echo around through it.

_ I found him. _

Bruised and rotting skin be damned, Riku leans down, and gathers Sora into his arms, careful not to scratch him with his claws. 

He’s featherlight. It takes little to no effort to lift him. 

Meticulously, Riku smooths Sora’s bangs away from his face and out of his eyes, very, very careful not to let his nails touch or otherwise mar the skin of Sora’s face. 

This feeling. It’s...it’s…

Whatever it is, he can barely breathe at the intensity of it. It is a bone deep catharsis, something that seems to rearrange his very veins in it’s insistent burn.

Mindful of the horns, Riku allows his head to lower, and gently touches his own forehead to Sora’s, allowing his eyes to close in pure exhaustion. The simple contact is a better balm than any Curaga he’s ever cast in his life.

_ I found you. I found you. I found you. I found you. I found you. I found you. I found you. _

_ You’re safe now.  _

_ Now...to get us both home.  _

“Riku!!”

His head jerks up at the familiar voice, and in that instant he locks gazes with Kairi. 

She’s floating slightly above him, glowing with such intensity that Riku can barely look directly at her. Like an angel set alight, she hangs in the air perfectly weightless.

Her gaze is lit up, glowing in pure white, no trace of its former ocean blue, but it’s still Kairi. Staring at him, reaching for the two of them with both radiant arms. 

Yet another sob catches itself in the back of Riku’s throat. “Kai-Kairi-” His voice breaks on her name, and he stares up at her awe. 

She smiles, and even though her features are hidden slightly in the blaze of her radiance, Riku can still see the gemstone-like tears rolling down her cheeks. “I finally found you.” Her voice is breathless.

His heart swells, for a whole host of reasons, not all of which have a name. All he can do is beam up at her, even through the inky black tear tracks on his own face and his otherwise corrupted appearance. Such things are banished to the back of his mind, at the mere sight of her.

Kairi floats lower, a gentle descent that seems in perfect tempo with the thudding of Riku’s heart. She leans in, and it is with mingled acceptance and and faint gentle resentment that Riku watches her press a gentle kiss to Sora’s forehead.

Sora still does not stir, and maybe it’s Riku’s imagination, but his face seems to relax slightly, even further into careless slumber.

Next, she turns her face up towards him, and he’s greeted with Kairi’s smile, something that radiates like the sun. She reaches up, and Riku’s breath yet again catches in his throat as she leans up towards him and-

The instant her hand comes up to touch against his cheek, it  _ burns  _ with a vengeance. 

A soft chime rings out in that same instant, but neither of them notice. 

Kairi pulls her hand away with a harsh cry, as if it hurt her too, and Riku clasps at his face in disbelief. 

Where her fingers brushed, his skin is deeply burnt. Blood that’s neither red nor black nor purple comes away on his hand when he presses his fingers against it, and summarily hisses lowly when it sends waves of pain throughout the side of his face.

His gaze instinctively turns to Kairi, and she’s clasped her hands against her chest as if to keep from brushing against him again. “Riku…” The glittering tears are starting to come faster now. 

The first instinct that rises up in his chest is the one to reach for her, but Riku reigns it back in. “I…” He swallows hard. “Kairi, how did you get…”

His question trails away in the next moment. The light is rising all around them, until their surroundings are no longer visible at all. 

It’s just him, the precious body cradled in his arms, and Kairi, left dangling somewhere among the growing light. 

Riku pulls Sora tighter against his chest, using both arms now. He leans towards Kairi, without thinking. 

They can’t get seperated. Not again. Not now.

...huh?

Kairi...Kairi is still glowing. But now...now she’s starting to become  _ see-through _ . 

She seems to notice this at about the same time as him, and the panicked look on her face makes something deep inside Riku’s heart harden. 

“R-Riku.” Her voice is wobbly, and Riku can only stare at her and hope it’s enough to keep her there. “What’s going...on?”

Blindly, he pulls Sora more securely against his chest, and uses his free arm to reach for her without quite touching. “I...I don’t know.” His eyes are wide. “Kairi...I…” 

So many thoughts spill up and over the edges of his mind in that instant. There’s the desire to comfort her, to protect, to shield her from this unknown.

_ If this is not love, I do not understand what to call it. _

She hiccups slightly, and brushes at her shimmering tears with hands like glass. “I...Riku, I’m scared.” 

There is no sound, except for her shuddering breaths and Riku’s own heart pounding in his ears. 

The light continues to grow around them.

Riku struggle to keep his eyes open and fixed on Kairi. He strains against the overwhelming desire to submit, to collapse. “Just…” He draws in a harsh breath. “Just stay close to me, alright?” He can hear the tension in his own voice, struggling to stay abreast of the rising panic. 

The tears stained inky black are coming down his face again, and they  _ sting  _ when they touch against the still raw burn marks. 

Kairi is crying harder now, and she reaches out to hold onto Sora’s arm. Her hands leave no wounds on his bicep, and Riku ignores the feeling that rises up at that. 

He numbly lowers the arm that was reaching for her, and uses it to support Sora’s knees instead, bridal style. 

Sora’s face, where it rests against his shoulder, is as peaceful as ever. He does not stir in the slightest at Kairi’s grip on his arm. Indeed, among the growing light, his countenance is lit up in a way that’s almost angelic. 

Riku’s breath hitches, and he shoves down the desire to pull Kairi’s burning form into a hug. “I…”

Kairi looks up at him through her tears, and Riku can only hope she understands the sentiment. “Are we...are we going to…” She can’t seem to bring herself to say the obvious.

_ Die? Here, among the light? Unable to touch...and Sora won’t wake up.  _

He grits his teeth. “We won’t.”

Kairi stares at him with her increasingly translucent face as though he’s lost his mind. “Riku, we-”

He cuts her off. “We won’t alright? Listen…” He takes a deep breath. “Okay. Here’s what we’re going to do, alright?”

Kairi only nods dumbly in response. 

Riku forges ahead without really knowing where he’s going. “We’re going to hold tight to each other’s hearts, alright? That way we won’t be seperated, no matter what happens.”

Her face is pinched. “What do I do?” Her eyes are burning with more than just a fey light.

Shifting his hold on Sora, Riku inhales. “Just...keep us in your thoughts. Reach out to our bond.” He nods down at the still slumbering Sora. “What would he say in this situation?” He looks back to Kairi, and no amount of panic could stifle the fond smile he relaxes into. “...we’ll always be connected when we carry each other in our hearts. Nothing can tear us apart that way.” 

_ Even I believe that, now. _

The smile that Kairi gives him in return is bright in more ways than one, and Riku finds his breath caught again. “...mm.” Her eyes are overflowing in diamonds now, but her expression is peaceful. “We’ll be together forever that way...right?” 

Her voice cracks on the last word, and Riku can’t bear that he can’t hug her. “Of course.” His tone comes out slightly more affectionate than he intended, but nothing can quite bring him to care in that instant.

The light has built to the point where Riku’s eyes flutter shut of their own accord. Kairi’s hitched breathing is the only thing to tell him she’s still by his side. 

...it’s warm. 

He can feel the tears tracing their way down his face. 

_ Sora...Kairi… _

_ I wish you two could’ve avoided this...whatever  _ this  _ is. _

_ But I suppose it’s too late now. _

_ To die...like this? With the company of the two people I love most in all the worlds? _

_ Surely that can’t be such a bad fate. _

The edges of his consciousness begin to feel frayed. It is the same sensation as stepping into the light when it took Kairi’s form, something that gently envelopes him and then steals his awareness away all at once. 

This is that all at once. 

_ [10/10 Pure Lights Obtained] _


	8. Dawn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The sun rises gently. How will you proceed?

Darkness. 

Darkness in incomprehensible intensity. 

He is completely alone, suspended loosely in the inky mire. 

Riku does not bother to open his eyes. There is no point, when the darkness is so thick it seeps straight through his eyelids and plunges the warm darkness of unconsciousness into something chilling, and morbid.

_ I was…. _

_ I was. _

_ Is this the evermore? _

_ …!!! _

_ Sora!! _

_ I can’t...I _ know _ I was holding onto him… _

_ Why can’t I feel him anymore? _

_ Sora! _

_ Kairi?! _

_ I’m… _

_ We must have been separated somehow. _

Darkness continues, as it ever does. Stretching on without end, a shapeless, comfortless abyss.

Is he even breathing?

_ ...I’m used to being alone. It’s a devil I know well. But this… _

_ This is a new kind of alone. I don’t...I can’t even tell who or what I am anymore. _

_ Do I even exist at all? Outside of the people who knew me? Was there ever any ‘me’ other than what I became for the world around me? Any sort of meaning attached to the person I was when I was alone? _

_ Fragility...that’s what’s consuming me. _

_ ...some things remain. Some vestiges of the person I know I was before coming here. _

_ I know myself. Too well, maybe. I know that I think too much when I’m alone. I know that those worries and fears and doubts melt away when I look into his eyes. I know that all my insecurities fade from shrieks into faint murmurs when she smiles. _

_ Keeping each other in our hearts...I can’t feel Sora or Kairi at all. I can barely feel myself. I’m fading...into shadow, aren’t I. _

_ But the memories are still here. _

_ There’s a boy I know. His name is Sora. I’ve known him for as long as I can remember. There’s also a girl...named Kairi. I’ve known her almost as long. _

_ The other memories are blurring together...I can barely keep them straight anymore. But I know that much for a fact. _

_ Even here...among everlasting shadow, there are some things that I, a person named Riku, could never forget. They are devastatingly and irrevocably etched into his (my) heart. Like the way cold hard stone scratches away to reveal another color, letting patterns and pictures and fantasies grow in size and detail… _

_ Until the dark ocean rips away at the walls of a cave, and those dreams and hopes carved into a stone wall become nothing more than scattered rubble at the bottom of the sea. An island consumed by darkness, left to waste away into shadow until some proud king rebuilds another island on the ruins of what once was. _

_ Life begets life. Death begets death. As humans, we flicker between the two, almost powerless to control the trajectory of this fated waltz. _

_ Is this...the price? Is this because I was determined to make sure Sora could cheat the fate he must have wrought for himself? _

_ Well. Look how that went. Not only did I fail, I dragged Kairi in with me. _

_ ...no. I can’t lie to myself that much. I know she would’ve run after me of her own accord, even if I’d had the opportunity to try to dissuade her. That’s how she is. That’s the strength of what ties us together. _

_ But I don’t think even a heartfelt poem in a bottle, set adrift on a shadowy sea, could help us where we are now. _

_ Fading, into shadow, never to return to this form. Even the me of two years ago accepted that this was how it would probably end. I have no one to blame but myself for the set of circumstances that led to my being here right at this moment. _

_ I guess...the main regret that’s hurting me right now...is that I know Sora and Kairi are probably suffering a similar fate. All I can hope for is that Kairi’s light was enough to save both her and Sora. That’s the explanation I have to cling to so I won’t break. _

_ ...but at least I got to see other worlds, didn’t I. I can only hope the child me who longed for that so badly can finally rest easy. _

_ ... _

_ Lingering here, it seems pointless. I can still think. I’m still...me. Why prolong this meaningless agony? Why haven’t the shadows consumed me yet? I know my light isn’t strong enough to hold me together like it might for Sora. I....I know that...so why am I still trying so hard? _

_ …? _

_ …...there's...there's a faint glow up ahead...getting bigger. My ears are starting to ring...it’s so bright, I can see it even through my eyelids. Is this...the true form of oblivion? A blinding white light, in which nothing can exist? _

…….

“Riku!!”

_ M...Mickey…? Is that voice back...to taunt me… _

_ ...why can’t I just fade away already. I wish it wouldn’t drag on like this. _

“Riku?”

_ What…? _

_ Tha...that’s Naminé… _

_ They’re...calling out for me… _

_ ...I should answer. I want to answer...even if it’s just another trick. _

Light.

A sparkling light.

_ A...a heart? _

Light beckons. 

_ Many...many hearts…...as far as the eye can see. _

“Riku! Please open your eyes!”

_ I know that voice too...Xion. _

“Riku…?”

_ I...I think that’s Terra… _

_ What’s going on…? _

_ Do they know where Sora is?! Is he with Kairi?? Are they safe?! _

_ I need...I need to find… _

_ It shouldn’t matter anymore, but- _

Light spills over, illuminating. 

Riku’s eyes fly open with a start, and he blindly jerks upright.

...too fast, it would seem, and he falls backwards immediately, equilibrium lost in the blind panic.

Mickey Mouse looms over him, like a concerned specter. “Riku!! You’re finally awake!”

_ I...what? _

_ I was...sleeping? _

Riku blinks confusedly up at him. “Mickey...I…”

With a literal jolt, he remembers, and his hand fists in the front of the king’s jacket. “Mickey!! Where are Sora and Kairi?!”

The mouse king gently eases Riku’s panicked grip away from him, and graces Riku with a kind smile. “Don’t worry. All three of you fellas are safe and sound.” 

His hands go limp, and Riku stares up at him in disbelief. “Wha...where…”

The surface he’s laying on suddenly shifts, and Riku belatedly realizes he’s pillowed in Terra’s lap. The older keyblade wielder gives him a slightly crooked grin, and when he speaks, his quiet voice is gentle. “You’re home.”

Riku stares up at him blankly, uncomprehending.

_ I was...I thought for sure… _

_ The light was going to swallow us up. The light _ did _ swallow us up. _

A sound drags his attention away, and Riku’s gaze snaps to his right, over Mickey’s shoulder.

There, a few feet away, Kairi is laying, pillowed in Lea’s arms. Her eyes are closed, and she seems to be comfortably in slumber. Her face is slack, and she’s curled up tightly like she normally does while sleeping deep, snoring slightly.

Another item of note would be that she’s not glowing.

Riku scrabbles for purchase to pull himself upright, unable to take his gaze off of her. It’s as he does so, that it begins to initially sink in. 

The hands which fight for grip on the ground, which is quite dusty as he distantly notes, are entirely unremarkable. Callused, pale like the rest of him, and unmistakably human. 

A faint noise breaks it’s way out of his throat at the realization, and he brings his own hands up to his face in wonderment. 

He’s...he looks _ human _ again. His nails are back to being blunt, and hair no longer spills around his waist like a curtain, instead back in the short cut he remembers. No wings flex at his shoulder blades, and after pawing at his head, it becomes clear that no twisted horns rise out of his forehead any longer.

Belatedly, Riku realizes that he’s shaking, and that Mickey and Terra’s hands are gently holding him upright. 

“Riku!”

He looks up, and meets Xion’s gaze. Exuberant, she smiles down at him brightly, and it’s then that Riku sees the sky up above them is pale blue and mostly clouded over.

They’re in the Keyblade Graveyard, at midmorning. 

Xion’s expression is beaming. “You’re safe now.” 

Riku’s heart suddenly transports itself into his throat in the next instant, and his head whips from side to side. “So-”

Already stepping aside, as if she knows what he’s going to say before he does, Xion points easily to a pile of figures only a few steps away. “He’s alright.” 

There, nestled between the identically relieved expressions of Roxas and Ventus, Sora is propped up, still deep in slumber. He’s lodged securely between the two, as if he’s a stuffed toy that the pseudo-twins have been forced to share. The distinctive voices of the king’s magician and his laidback captain are also present, and it’s then that Riku becomes aware that they’ve gathered quite a crowd here. 

To his right, Kairi still lays in quiet repose, being held up by Lea, and supported on her other side by Naminé. Master Aqua stands above them, visibly fretting while she mutters through a variety of healing spells under her breath. To the left, Sora is still buried under a very loud Roxas-and-Ventus-and-Goofy-and-Donald shaped pile, presumably not even bothered within the deep sleep that continues to hold him. Mickey and Terra are still holding him up, and Xion stands beaming at one side.

(Riku barely registers them until later, but the assembled group is numbered more than just within the initial circle. The young man with the scar between his eyes, a former Organization operative as he would later realise, is standing a little ways behind where Lea is holding up the seventh Princess of Heart. Not close enough to be drawn in to the reunion proper, but close enough to stand by. Even more confusing, another, shorter, figure stands beyond the young man, dark spiky hair and red eyes firmly on the scene from a distance. The boy’s face is set like a stone, but his fingers are twitching visibly, from an unknown cause.)

It is a struggle to find the words, after being so summarily deposited out of an abyss and into a golden morning. He doesn’t even know where to begin. 

Luckily, if there is one thing that King Mickey truly has a talent for, it is having the right words for diffusing tense and awkward situations. “Gee, Riku, what happened to ya? We all got a call from Naminé that you’d gone missing...and then-”

Before the mouse king can finish his sentence, Riku interjects. “How did you find us…? We...the light was about to swallow us up. I thought…” He takes a ragged inhale, as the morning sunlight continues to embrace him.

Mickey’s brow is furrowed. “Well...I’m not too sure where you all were, precisely...but we’ve got Lea to thank for finding ya!” He gestures proudly at the erstwhile assassin, who is currently paying him no attention whatsoever. “He was the one who called all us Guardians to this place.”

The Keyblade Graveyard. Riku attempts to keep his breathing even. 

“We felt you here, so we called out for you.” Mickey’s smile is as kind as always, but Riku has spent enough time with the little king by now that he can hear the undercurrent of curiosity in his voice.

Words remain elusive. To his horror, Riku realises he’s tearing up, and in his haste to restrain himself, his breath hitches loudly.

Mickey gently pats his shoulder, and before he can even think to stop himself, Riku is choking on a sob and hiding his face in his hands.

His pale, unremarkable human hands.

_ We...we’re here. _

_ We’re...safe? _

_ Safe…home. _

_ Anything that happens after this...I’m not lost anymore. _

_ We’re home. _

From there, his thoughts devolve into a blurry mess of things which have no name and things which have names that aren’t coherently thought through, and all in all, it feels as though the stress of however long it’s been is finally, finally, pouring itself from his eyes.

Tears, clear and insubstantial, and salty when they get on his lips.

“Riku.” Xion is tapping him lightly on the shoulder. 

He looks up at her, and her face momentarily blurs into someone else’s through his tears. Riku blinks, and his vision clears to reveal no other face but Xion’s own.

Her head tilts to the side, and wordlessly, she points. Confused, Riku follows the direction of her finger and-

Across from him, Kairi is slowly blinking away, and groggily looking around. She’s a little paler than normal, and her deep red hair is mussed up beyond recognition, but it’s _ her _ and she’s _ awake _.

Riku’s reaching out for her before he can realise what he’s doing, and it’s with a certain depth of resignation that he reigns his hands back to his lap, and forces himself to be content with just drinking in the sight of her.

His eyes flicker over to Sora, who continues to lie still with his eyes closed, and a pit in his stomach suddenly drops into existence. 

_ ...what...why won’t he- _

Sora yawns.

  
  


* * *

  
  


This sleep, this natural sleep, is empty and dreamless. 

Frankly, it’s a warm and pleasant darkness comes to an end far too soon, in Riku’s humble opinion. The hands at his shoulders are ripping him away from such a peaceful and empty solace...why don’t they understand?

Still. He can’t be too upset. Especially not when he blearily blinks awake to the sight of Sora, hale, hearty, whole, alive, grinning down on him like the sun. 

“Good morning,” Sora whispers to him, in a contagious smile. 

Riku is physically incapable of stopping the smile that curves over his own face in response. “Good morning, Sora,” he rasps back, voice still muddled by sleep. It’s tempting to respond with a playful snark, to stick to a script they’ve had more than a decade to build up and form, but…

He can’t tease Sora. Not today. Not like this. 

“Guys!!” A hiss from the direction of his open window causes Riku to turn his head.

Kairi perches on the window sill, dressed in her pajamas and framed in the moonlight. She’s white knuckled on the edge of the sill, and Riku doesn’t miss the way she greedily drinks in the mere sight of Sora at every available opportunity.

_ Can’t blame her at all, honestly. _

A quick glance at the clock on his bedside table shows that it’s a quarter to five. The sun’s not up yet in the slightest, and the sky outside is a deep jet that barely allows for the light of the moon. Clouds dot the sky, blacking out the stars. 

Riku groans, and sits up slowly, rubbing at his eyes. “Couldn’t you two have waited till morning?”

There’s no bite to the tone. None of them could’ve waited till the morning proper.

Sora grabs his shoulder and shakes him, and it’s impossible to miss the pure joy and excitement radiating off of him. “But neither of us can sleep!”

The feel of Sora’s fingers digging into his shoulder is less of a pain and more of a gift...one that he can never take for granted.

With another good natured sigh, he grudgingly gets out from the covers, and doesn’t even have time to grab for his boots before Sora and Kairi have each latched onto an arm and are pulling him out the window and onto the roof of the garage, and down from there onto the driveway leading out to the main road.

It’s a short walk on asphalt down to the beach, and, as with one mind, the three head for the docks. There’s no question as to where they’re going now.

To be completely straightforward, Riku’s well aware they’re not supposed to use the row boats at night, much less without an adult. But, frankly, with everything that’s been going on in Riku’s life for the past two years, the idea of getting punished for illicit row boat usage is not very intimidating, and well worth the rewards.

Kairi clambers into a boat that belongs to Sora’s family, and Sora follows closely after. Riku climbs in last, and reaches for the oars.

Sora grabs at one of them, and Riku promptly holds it out of his reach. “Let me help!” His voice is still somewhat hushed, even though they’re alone at the wharf. A strange and solemn mood has come over the three of them, beneath the darkness of night, and neither Sora nor Kairi seem eager to break it by speaking overly loud, or carelessly.

Riku shakes his head, but can’t bring it within himself to sneer teasingly at Sora like he might’ve once. “Not if you’re planning to steer like you steer a Gummiship.” 

With an enormous pout, Sora makes puppy dog eyes at him, and Riku resigns himself to the ensuing irrational guilt that denying him anything always brings. “You don’t need to row all by yourself...especially if you’re still tired.”

“And who’s fault is that, that I’m not still asleep right now.” Riku mutters, as he deftly unmoors the boat and pushes away. 

Kairi is watching them with an expression akin to rapture, and huffs in laughter when Sora’s pout grows in intensity. “Sora, I think your bottom lip is about to fall off.”

Sora makes a face at her, which causes Kairi to swat at his arm, which ultimately leads to them trying to rock the boat as little as possible with their mingled roughhousing and giggling.

His heart makes a home in the back of his throat as he watches them. They both seem to sparkle slightly in the pale moonlight filtering through the clouds, and the way it refracts off the surface of the water.

The play island grows marginally closer with each pass of the oars, but the ongoing ache in his muscles that Riku is waiting for never quite comes. It’s a quiet rhapsody in and of itself; the music the waves make as they crest lightly against the boat and each other, dancing softly in the night. The wood of the oars is rough on his hands. It has been sometime since he’s done any rowing like this, but it’s not unlike riding a bike in that his muscles remember on their own.

After not too long, their boat nudges against the shallows of the play island, and Sora and Kairi scramble out of the boat, heedless of being ankle deep in the surf. Riku climbs out after them, and the three pull the boat out of the shallows and up onto the beach beyond the tideline.

Their play island is wreathed in shadows, pale and grey under the dark sky and clouds. The wind is brushing lightly through the paopu trees, and it serves to give the already cool air a noticeable chill. 

Riku shivers lightly despite himself, and the sheer sensation of being able to feel goosebumps is a treasure in it’s own right. 

Kairi plops down flat on the sand, face up to look at the overcast sky. The deep jet above has faded slightly into muted periwinkle, heralding the coming sun. 

Kneeling down next to her, Sora’s face is tilted upwards, watching the clouds shift lazily in the wind. “Do you think it’ll rain?”

“No...see? The clouds are dispersing so quickly.” Kairi’s right, the chilly breeze weaving around the play islands is the same wind that’s quickly banishing the clouds hiding the stars above.

The sky continues to lighten, but the sun has not yet made it’s grand appearance. The lingering suspension before dawn tightens ever so slightly. Riku kneels down on Kairi’s other side, and tries not to breathe too loudly.

It’s protruding into his thoughts with a painful intensity. Before he can stop himself, Riku’s eyes guiltily track to Sora’s neck. It’s bare, as the crown necklace apparently did not return along when they did. It’s somewhat jarring, to see Sora out and about without it around his neck.

Sora catches him staring, and graces him with a beaming grin before Riku can look away. “What is it?” Sora’s posture is relaxed, but Riku doesn’t miss the slight curve of his shoulders that betrays his current fragility. 

_ Is it painful for him...to be alive again so suddenly? I haven’t asked. I’m afraid to. _

Riku pulls his eyes away to look down the beach to where the grayish waves are lapping at the sand. “Mm. Nothing important.” Their voices remain quiet, most likely inaudible to each other if they were any further apart.

A solemn air overtakes him, separate from whatever quietude their trio seems hesitant to break. He’s succeeded. Sora is back with them. They’re all three safe and whole. And yet…

He can’t fathom what it is, but some piece of the whole picture seems to be missing.

Sora leans across Kairi to invade his space, and opens his mouth to inquire further, but Kairi, devil incarnate in princess form, reaches up to tickle his ribs. Sora squeals and rears back, most likely intent on giving as good as he’s getting, and that’s what finally does it. 

His breath hitches, and before he can stuff it down and not break the moment, Riku hears himself stutter on a laugh hidden in a cough, and then the waterfall breaks loose and he’s chortling into his hands at the sight of Sora and Kairi, rolling around still dressed in their pajamas and throwing handfuls of sand at each other. 

The sound of it does, in fact, break the trance the three of them had settled into, and Riku turns away to hide his mirth as the other two turn to look at him. Relief mingles with guilt and sheer ecstasy, and settles into the back of his chest as a gently burning ember. 

Turning back to them once he’s finally stuffed the hilarity down, he finds two pairs of blue eyes regarding him with an expression he doesn’t know how to describe. It feels...oddly intense, as though he’s standing trial for some act he does not recall. 

Riku blinks, lost. “Is there something on my face?”

He’s greeted by two twin shakes of dissent, and the moment is promptly erupted when Kairi chooses that moment to stuff another handful of sand down the back of an unsuspecting Sora’s shirt. The roughhousing begins again, and Riku has to utilise the dodging skills he’s picked up to narrowly avoid getting a glob of sand to the face.

Once they’ve settled down, out of a sand throwing wrestling match that turned into a game of tag somewhere along the way, Riku is picking his way through the shallows, in search of something. The sun is barely peeking above the horizon line, and by now the clouds are all but gone, leaving the sky a wash of periwinkle and pale blue, and the ocean a stunning complement.

After a few minutes, he finds what he’s looking for. This one is suitable, sparkling slightly in the glimmering surf.

Promptly, he rips off a decorative string from the ankle of his sweatpants, and gets to work. Only minor alterations are needed, and it is within a few moments that he has a finished product that will suffice.

Task completed, he meanders over to where Sora is drawing in the sand with a stick of driftwood. 

“Hey.”

Sora looks up from his masterful stick figure rendition of Donald Duck curiously. “Hm?”

Riku kneels down next to him, keeping his secret hidden in his hand for the moment. “So I noticed you’re missing your necklace.”

Funnily enough, Sora flushes a dusty pink color, and it’s to Riku’s slight surprise that he almost looks _ bashful _ . “Ah...yeah...I’m really sorry about that.” He looks down, and Riku’s brows knit together at the serious expression that takes over his friend’s face. “I don’t know what happened to it.” Sora’s lips purse, and it’s to his chagrin that the normally cheerful face has suddenly become so glum. “...I _ know _ I had it, when I first woke up there.”

Riku’s head tilts to the side. “There…?”

Sora nods, setting down the stick and shifting to face him. “It’s kinda hazy to think about, but I remember I was in the dark. The only things there were the sea and the night sky, and thousands of stars everywhere you looked.” His expression shutters slightly. “I know there was more...but I can’t remember much after that.” 

Slowly, Riku nods. “...I see.” His fingers run over the object clutched in his fist, contemplative. “Well...it’s not a replacement, but it’ll have to do for the time being.”

Head tilted to the side, adorably, Riku notes, Sora’s eyes widen in confusion. “Huh? What are you-”

Untangling it from around his fingers, Riku leans forward. It is indeed nothing much, but it’s better than seeing Sora’s neck undecorated. Selfish, perhaps, but he’ll give himself this minor indulgence. 

It’s a thalassa shell, tinted pale blue and yellow at the edges. It wasn’t too difficult to find one with a naturally occurring hole, and while the ribbon it’s threaded onto is certainly less sturdy than a chain, Riku knows how to tie knots that won’t come undone, by hell or highwater.

The makeshift necklace dangles loosely from where he quickly tied it around Sora’s neck, and Riku swiftly leans backwards before the momentary proximity of their faces becomes _ too _awkward.

Sora reaches up to the shell, eyes wide. “You...made this?”

It’s hard to avoid the splash of embarrassment that colors his tone, and Riku looks away and to the side. “Yeah. I’ll find you a better one later, but for now…”

All the breath is chased out of his chest when Sora launches himself at him, careful not to break the shell. It’s enough to knock him backwards into the sand, now with an armful of Sora. 

...he’s so warm, where his arms are clasped around Riku’s neck. 

Riku can only pray his cheeks aren’t the color of watermelon right now, and instead focuses on trying to sit up again. “Geez, Sora.” He forces a small laugh, and hopes it hides how flustered he’s quickly getting. “It’s not _ that _ great of a gift.”

Leaning back from the embrace, Sora’s face is tilted down where he’s studying the present now hanging around his neck, and his voice, when he finally speaks, is serious. “I won’t lose it this time.”

It takes an extra measure of thought, to remember how to breathe properly in that moment. Riku exhales softly, and tries not to think about the fact that Sora is still technically sitting in his lap at the moment. 

“...good.” It’s unbearable to see his friend’s face so drawn, and he can’t resist reaching up to ruffle at Sora’s spiky hair. “But if you do, you know I’ll just get you another one, right?”

Sora looks up at that, still not smiling. “I still won’t lose it.”

He blinks. Well. “It’s really not that imp-”

“I won’t!” Sora is curled forward slightly in on himself where he’s still sitting on Riku’s legs, and it’s with mounting horror that Riku realises tears are starting to form in those blue eyes. “...I’ll never let myself lose something so precious to me again.”

It seems highly doubtful that Sora is truly at fault for losing the necklace, but Riku’s not about to push the matter. Instead, he reaches up and smoothly thumbs away the first tear that’s making it’s way down Sora’s cheek. “I believe you.” He offers Sora a smile that he can only hope contains a fraction of the radiant light that Sora’s own smiles do.

Sora opens his mouth as if to respond, but before he can-

“Guys!!” Kairi jogs over from where she’d been practicing her tree climbing skills and plops down beside them. “What’s up?” Riku watches her eyes immediately swing to the new necklace adorning Sora’s neck.

Sora rubs at his face with the back of his hand and grins at her. “Look what Riku made me!”

Kairi leans over to look and hums appreciatively. “It’s pretty! The shells on the beach are so good for making accessories.” She reaches out to inspect the single shell, and for some reason that act almost feels more tenuous to Riku than the act of giving it to Sora himself.

Letting the seashell fall back to dangle at Sora’s chest, Kairi turns to look at him. “I didn’t know you made jewelry, Riku!” Her tone is light, and teasing.

He huffs at the words. “Hardly. Last I checked it doesn’t take a special skill to put a shell or a bead on a string.” Phrasing it that way simply makes it seem more inane, and he almost begins to regret not just leaving it somewhere for Sora to find it later.

It’s such a small thing after all. Hardly any significance whatsoever. 

_ ...I don’t know how to explain it. He always wore that crown so proudly...it made me so happy that he...that he… _

_ I really don’t know how to explain it. _

“Oh! That reminds me.” Kairi turns slightly, and reaches for something behind her. 

What she retrieves makes every hackle on Riku’s neck rise, and if it weren’t for Sora still sitting on his knees, he would’ve fled then and there.

Kairi brandishes a single paopu fruit, expression firm. Sora’s eyes go wide.

A thousand things bubble up in his throat and he banishes them back down to the depths with a single blow. It’s not really comfortable to try to wriggle his legs out from under Sora without displacing his friend, but he _ really can’t deal with this right now. _

“I’ll…” He ignores that his breath catches slightly, and hopes the others didn’t hear it. “I’ll leave you two alone.” He worms one leg out from under Sora.

He _ really _ hopes that they can’t hear the slight panic and resignation that must be in his voice. 

_ This is the way things are meant to be. _

_ This is how everyone knows it’s going to be. Should be used to it by now. _

It’s a bit like being back in the shadowy mists of those wretched, empty worlds. A place where his every sense is dulled, and silence greets every word he tries to voice.

A numbness to replace the pain. A numbness to replace what could’ve been, if things were different. 

Kairi’s hand catches his wrist.

“Riku.”

He’s successfully freed the other leg now, and is turning away, already halfway to standing. “...yes?”

It’s not a nice feeling, to force himself to look back at her, unsure of what expression will be there. He doesn’t dare look towards Sora’s face at all.

Kairi tugs at his wrist. “You don’t need to go anywhere.” 

Before he can blink stupidly for a moment and ask the obvious question, Sora grabs his other wrist, and Riku finds his eyes drawn to him on instinct. Sora’s never been good at disguising his expressions, and right now his face is an open book. 

“She’s right.” He’s pleading desperately for something, that’s for sure, but Riku has no idea what it is, or how to give it to him.

Kairi’s grip gentles suddenly. “I mean. Unless you’d rather not stay.” And for the first time tonight, Kairi looks unsure of herself. Her gaze stays on Riku, but he can practically hear her mind going a million miles a minute. 

He stays kneeling, but sits back onto the sand. For the moment, at least. “...a paopu fruit? Isn’t that...didn’t you two already…”

The legend is a mere old wive’s tale. And yet, if there’s anything Riku’s learned in his world travels, old wive’s tales generally have more stock than they’re given credit for. 

To forever entwine paths of destiny together...it’s a nice thought, for what it is. The bonds that tie hearts together seem to be made of much the same thing, some unique force guiding and shaping and molding the features of life itself.

He knows he didn’t make up _ that _ particular memory. Indeed, there’s been some points where he very much would've liked to forget it. The sight of Sora and Kairi, silhouetted up on their tree, _ their _ tree, each partaking in the old legend. 

A picture perfect moment, wreathed in the lingering glow of the sunset.

He doesn’t begrudge them. Really, he doesn’t. It’s just…

It’s a dream, that’s what it is. The most insubstantial kind of dream. Something he can cradle close to his heart and never speak of to anyone but the silence.

_ The idea that we...that the three of us… _

_ I guess I want what those two have. To be a part of it? It sounds ridiculous when phrased like that but… _

_ It used to be that I was afraid of being shut out. Left behind, and ultimately forgotten about. I know that wouldn’t happen, but… _

_ Now. Now it’s just...those two deserve happiness. And if they get that by being together...I could only ever support them in that. _

_ I can get used to this sadness. I’m stronger than it. I’m sure with time… _

It’s a hollow lie to himself. A habit that he can’t break entirely...but a seemingly necessary skill. Something to use to stay afloat, in a place where fate may be against his happiness. 

_ Happiness is seeing them happy. I can live with that. I _ will _ live with that, if that’s what it takes. It sounds trite, even in my head, but I love them. And didn’t someone once say that loving someone enough is knowing when to let them go…? _

Kairi holds up the yellow fruit again. “Since...since last time, it didn’t work quite as well as I’d hoped, I figured we ought to try again.” Sora cracks a crooked grin, and Riku finds that he can’t look away from either of them. “So I thought we could all share one!”

It’s an objectively straightforward declarative, but Riku has to sit there blankly for a few moments before he can come to terms with it. Is...is this just a way for them not to be separated again or…

Sora’s own awkwardness saves him from having to ask the obvious question himself. “B-but...isn’t...isn’t sharing _ one _paopu fruit sort of…” His friend’s voice has risen in pitch slightly, and the faint tremor is unmissable.

It’s a tradition in practice among newlyweds on the islands, that as part of the ceremony they each bite out of the same fruit. A pseudo-sacred act, meant to further signify an everlasting promise to be together.

It’s...it’s not something you’d do with a _ friend _. 

His face must be in flames right now, and he doesn’t dare to look over at Sora to see how he’s faring. He can only continue to stare fixedly at the fruit in Kairi’s hands, and partially hope that the sand drops out from under him and he no longer has to deal with the swirling questions and the overwhelmingly awkward feeling that consumes him.

The faint hope rising in his chest is the worst part.

Kairi’s head tilts to the side, and her expression is serious, no longer playful. “I guess that’s what I’m trying to ask.” She seems to take a quick breath to steel herself, and Riku almost hopes that her hesitation would last a moment longer so _ he _can have a chance to grapple with what seems to be going on but-

“I think I’ve known for awhile now, how I feel.” Kairi’s gaze drops to the fruit she’s loosely holding. “We’ve known each other for awhile and…” She takes another short breath. “You both mean so much to me. It was worse than any other pain I’ve felt, the pain of being ripped apart from you both.” She raises her head, and Riku’s breath is stolen by the sheer fire in those watery blue eyes. “I never want to feel that again. And...and I…”

It seems Riku’s not the only one who’s having difficulties putting words to things. None of them have really had a chance to sit down and talk about what happened, since their initial reunion yesterday morning in the Keyblade Graveyard was a mix of tears and chaos and confusion, and after that there had been the rush of bringing Sora home, and the sheer _ exhaustion _ from dealing with that, and before anyone knew it, they had all fallen asleep at the first opportunity and then…

And now here they were. 

“I...please tell me if I’m wrong, but…” Kairi’s voice is slightly thicker, and Riku has to fight down the urge to interrupt hug her then and there, “I’m so overwhelmed by feelings...about the two of you.” She swallows hard. “I...I get it if you don’t feel the same way. But…” Her face turns slightly pink.

“I love you both so much.” There is no room for hesitation in the air, and she proffers the fruit again. “So, as someone who loves you, I would like to share this with you.”

Silence reigns for a moment. 

Sora’s breath hitches, and Riku’s gaze goes to him like a magnet. “Kairi…”

Kairi’s face is burning in a similar color to her hair now, and she flinches slightly at Sora’s voice. “...yeah?”

The tears from before are back, and Sora’s gaze is incredibly watery as he breaks into a wide smile. “Of course we will. Won’t we, Riku?” And that bright gaze turns hopefully in his direction, and Riku can’t quite miss that it seems to be gauging his reaction in the process. 

He nods numbly, and tries to remember how to form sentences. “...I’d be honored to.”

The unspoken _ ‘we love you too’ _has all the time in the world to be said with oxygen and vocal chords, even if for now it only exists within the air between them.

_ We love you so much. _

Nothing feels quite real, and yet something in him is completely aware this isn’t a dream. 

Kairi bites into one leg of the star shaped fruit, and holds it out to Sora. He takes it, and bites into the one next to it. 

It’s difficult, to remember how to do things like breathe and move his arms as Sora then holds the fruit out to him.

If only he could imprint this image on the back of his eyelids...Sora, holding the bright star of the paopu fruit out to him, Kairi to the side, both looking at him with eyes that are unbearably fond, and something else he is almost too afraid to name.

_ I don’t know if I’m getting it all wrong. But this can’t possibly be anything but love. _

_ Was this...was I afraid of this? This vulnerability? How I feel like they could see right through me in this moment? _

_ I’d still love them if we were all made of glass, so I suppose it doesn’t matter. _

The fruit, when he bites into it, is almost too sweet for his taste, but frankly, it could have tasted like rotting milk and the moment would still shine with blessed purity in his memory. 

The sun is rising.

Sometime later, after more words have been said and questions have been answered and more tears have been cried out, the three are standing in the surf, watching the sun streak the waves into pale aqua blue and light pink. The water is pleasantly cool, even in the full of autumn, for Destiny Islands never gets well and truly cold.

Riku’s eyes are closed, basking in the touch of the wind and the water, and the sound of Sora and Kairi’s voices as they splash each other and laugh. Some of the surrounding spray catches his face, and bemused, he brushes his now damp hair out of his face.

The world is sparkling around him. Burning, with a rainbow of colors and vibrancy. It is almost too much, but something swells within him, rising up to meet it in it’s exuberancy, and he knows without a doubt that he too is colored in the glowing platitudes of morning.

He lifts his gaze, to where the other two are dancing in the shallows. Kairi’s hair is practically plastered to her skin, but it glows red in the touch of the sun. Sora fares no better, but even drenched his hair still manages to hold it’s ridiculous spikes.

Riku’s breath catches in his throat.

Where Kairi stands, framed against the glow of morning, her arms are diamonds in the light. Faintly see through, and reflecting off her edges in ways he _ shouldn’t _be able to see. For example, her right shoulder, facing away from him, is directly visible through her side. 

...Sora is the same. Riku stares at where his left arm hangs beside him, at an angle where he shouldn’t be able to see it from where he stands. The colors play against each other in a farce, the tints of normality fading slightly in this revelation.

The sun gleams behind and straight through the both of them. 

_ Light...which reveals all and lets nothing hide in it’s touch. _

He can’t breathe. He can barely think. 

Sora turns to him, and flashes a smile. He glows, and even against the crystal blue water, nothing could dull that radiance. Kairi splashes up beside him, and as one, they reach for Riku, to pull him further into the surf, and into their game. 

Riku steps forward, towards the glow.

* * *

  
  


The book closes with a firm _ click _.

The Master leans back in his chair, and staples his fingers under his chin. His posture is relaxed for the most part, but his toe taps the ground lightly in thought. 

“Hmmm...no. This won’t do at all. Nope.” 

He stands with a bounce, and wanders over to the window. The light comes through the stained glass in little rainbows, dancing over the ground as his shadow interferes with their path. It shines especially brightly on a certain silver necklace, left carelessly on the large round table in the room.

“....this simply will not do.”

Turning back to the desk, the Master flips the book back open, and begins paging through slowly. He stops, at a section just past the middle.

“Hmmmmmmm. It might fit here. But then again...who knows with that one.”

He sits back down with a sigh, and crosses his legs. “You really couldn’t just make this easier for me, could you Sora.” 

The next few pages are looked over in due turn. “Imagine! Kingdom Hearts, what a sneaky old beast that one has shaped up to be.” He chuckles to himself for a moment. “Pretty spry for a moon, huh.”

The page flipping resumes. After a few more minutes of hemming and hawing over it, he seems to come to a conclusion. 

With a snap, the book is clicked shut again.

If inanimate hoods could smile in glee, this one would. “I think I’ve got at least the first part of it all worked out. Now, let’s remind ourselves of the _ real _ facts here, shall we?” 

_ Fin. _

  
  
  
  


  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In true Kingdom Hearts fashion, I have elected to explain what happened, but only outside of the source material. If you don’t care about any of the technicalities of this story, feel free to ignore this! Thank you for reading this far anyway~. 
> 
> Now, for the notes, in which I expose my hand as the most pretentious author this side of the pacific.
> 
> 1\. Riku is not in a dream, but lost in shadow! I would consider shadows to fill up the space between pure darkness and where Kingdom Hearts itself exists in a metaphysical sense. A ‘Phantom Realm’. He falls through darkness into this Phantom Realm through the cracks in his dreams, so simply another grey area where ‘sleep and death overlap’. 
> 
> 2\. The Pure Lights that Riku collects are the pathways further into the Shadow Realm that Kairi is unconsciously forming by collecting the Shadow Fragments. The Fragments are the shadows that have obscured Riku’s bond to Sora. Riku is only traveling through the ‘Phantom Worlds’ because Kairi is collecting those pieces in time with his experiences.
> 
> 3\. Mickey’s voice is a hallucination! Riku’s own, to be specific. Similar to how Aqua’s own voice torments her in the RoD. (Is the phantom Sora that Riku sees a projection from Sora’s heart through their bond, or another hallucination? I wonder~.)
> 
> 4\. The ‘light portals’ appear as Kairi because they represent Kairi’s bond to Riku, and, more technically, Riku’s strongest bond to a source of pure light, coupled with that Kairi is the one unconsciously creating them.
> 
> 5\. As Riku gets closer to Kingdom Hearts, a source of pure light, his form mutates because (to put it loosely in the Mickey hallucinations’ words) “light burns away and lets nothing hide in its touch”. The mutation is Riku’s darkness, now made physical as the light burns away the natural balance of his human body.
> 
> 6\. Vanitas was here! For this fic, I’m going to say that Vanitas was initially in Sora’s heart but after Sora died, he was unceremoniously ejected from Sora’s heart, and surreptitiously commandeered a leftover replica body of his own for the time being.
> 
> 7\. Kairi has a monster form/pirate outfit without Donald’s magic because of her charmed necklace, courtesy of Aqua. Does this line up with canon? To the best of my knowledge, not really. Let’s say the protection charm Aqua put on it extended to ‘not interfering with world order’!
> 
> 8\. Since Kairi and Riku are on the same path simultaneously, and both of them are intent on retrieving Sora, that’s why Kingdom Hearts latches onto Kairi and begins absorbing her pure light into itself. Sora rests within Kingdom Hearts’ light as a heart of near pure light, and their desire for him intensified the bond to the point where it became magnetic. Kingdom Hearts began artificially functioning as Sora’s point in the bonds between the three of them, and drew them in. This is why Kairi began to glow. The closer she came to the physical Kingdom Hearts, the stronger the pull became, and the more light consumed her.
> 
> 9\. An eagle eyed reader may notice that Kairi’s journey seems to take place over the course of a day. I know that the worlds all have a different time axis, so this one is just me looking at Nomura and going “I respect you, but in this instant, no”. Or, if we wanted to be a stickler about it, let’s say it all miraculously aligned to convey the appearance of a full day just by pure heccing coincidence! Problem solved!
> 
> 10\. The cloudy palatial realm where Riku finds Sora is an artificial area created by Kingdom Hearts for their reunion. The angelic behemoth that inhabits it is of pure light, refusing to allow any shadow to taint the place. Perhaps the being is Sora’s own light, protecting him from any disturbance while he exists in stasis? Perhaps not.
> 
> 11\. Once the three are physically reunited, the potency of the Kingdom Hearts superimposed bond is what causes the three of them to begin to fuse with its light. They only escape through their bonds to other people within the Realm of Light, who were assembled in the Keyblade Graveyard to call out to them.
> 
> 12\. Lea is the one who rallies the other guardians! Can’t lie to a good liar. How did he know where to take them? It’s amazing where the bonds between hearts can lead you.
> 
> 13\. It would appear that partially fusing with Kingdom Hearts and almost-but-not-quite entering an eternal glowing white oblivion doesn’t do much for your corporeal status...hope that works out for them.
> 
> TL;DR: shits metaphysical man.
> 
> This was not a fic I ever anticipated writing, nor it becoming such a large project by my standards, but it’s truly been a labor of love! I can only hope someone enjoys reading this story as much as I enjoyed writing it. <3


End file.
